Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — ENVIRONMENT

London Docklands Development Corporation

Mr. Spearing: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he is satisfied with the support given to voluntary organisations by the London Docklands Development Corporation.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Sir George Young): Yes, Sir. The LDDC has given considerable support to the work of voluntary organisations and to other projects benefiting the community. Resources available under the former docklands urban programme are tailing off as existing commitments are completed. I am, therefore, enabling the LDDC to make available additional resources for voluntary projects.

Mr. Spearing: I am grateful to the Minister for his reply. Can he be more explicit about the additional resources? Will the grants which the LDDC may be able to make be in addition to the notional 1 per cent. limit and enable the projects started at the time of the docklands joint committee to continue?

Sir George Young: These are additional resources and grants will be available to a new limit of £750,000 each year for voluntary sector funding. In addition, the LDDC can top that up from a pool of receipts.
We would normally expect the local authorities to take the time-expired projects on board. The LDDC will consider fresh applications where time-expired projects which contribute to regeneration cannot be funded by the usual means.

Mr. Chapman: Will my hon. Friend confirm that the LDDC does consult, and is willing to consult and meet, any tenants' organisation that represents part of the urban development corporation, as well as many local businesses and individuals? If there is obstruction to consultation and liaison, it comes from the heavy-handed and non-supportive role of the GLC in this vital area which we all wish to see regenerated in the interests of the metropolis as a whole.

Sir George Young: My hon. Friend is right. The LDDC makes every effort to consult local opinion. I commend to hon. Members the newsletter which it publishes regularly reporting on progress. Communication is not helped by the dogmatic refusal of Southwark borough council and the GLC to have any contact whatever with the LDDC. Such a ridiculous state of affairs should be brought to an end.

Mr. Simon Hughes: I accept and endorse the Minister's criticism of Southwark borough council, but does he agree that one way of improving the LDDC's communications would be to open the meetings of its board to the public, especially when they involve matters such as the grants with which we have been dealing today?

Sir George Young: No.

Mr. Leighton: Will the Minister pay tribute to the numerous volunteers who work for the 30 or so organisations that strive to make life more tolerable in the deprived inner city areas of east London? Does he recognise the impossibility of asking local authorities, in their straitened financial circumstances, to take on that burden? Will he agree not to wash his hands of these voluntary organisations and recognise his Department's responsibility for them? Will he at least agree today to meet a deputation to discuss the problems?

Sir George Young: I should be prepared to meet representatives of the voluntary organisations, but, as the LDDC has agreed a grant of £20,000 to the forum, I hope that such a meeting will be unnecessary. I endorse what the hon. Gentleman said about the valuable work performed by the voluntary organisations, and that is why the LDDC funds 183 community and voluntary sector projects through a host of separate organisations.

Metropolitan County Councils

Mr. Fatchett: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will set up a public inquiry into the financial implications of the abolition of the metropolitan county councils.

The Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Patrick Jenkin): No, Sir.

Mr. Fatchett: As the Secretary of State has refused to subject his proposals to objective and public scrutiny, and as his White Paper gave no cost implications of abolishing the metropolitan country councils, does he agree that the ratepayers in those areas have a right to be suspicious that their rate bills will increase as a result of his proposals? Does he also agree that for a Government to abolish a tier of local government, or to change local government in the way that he proposes, without conducting any impartial analysis of the costs involved, is unprecedented?

Mr. Jenkin: We are sure that savings can be made by eliminating a tier of government. I am beginning to recognise my wisdom in not seeking to pluck figures out of the air, because had I done so I might have underestimated the savings that could be achieved. When I was in the west midlands last week I heard that the Dudley council had expressed confidence that it could save 33 per cent. of staff currently engaged in the West Midlands county council on services which would be transferred to Dudley. I hope that the councils in the West Yorkshire area will do their best to emulate that example.

Mr. Maples: Does my right hon. Friend agree that one of the financial implications of the proposed local government reform is that the ratepayers of London will no longer have to pay for the political excesses of the GLC?

Mr. Jenkin: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The GLC's expenditure is so high that, quite apart from targets


and holdback—to which it is not subjected—it has taken itself out of the rate support grant altogether under the block grant system.

Mr. Parry: Will the Secretary of State consider the social implications of abolition? Is he aware that all those on Merseyside county council, including Conservative members, are utterly opposed to its abolition? Is the right hon. Gentleman further aware that the decision will be opposed tooth and nail by the Labour movement on Merseyside because further jobs will be lost there as a result of the county council's abolition?

Mr. Jenkin: The hon. Gentleman must make up his mind whether the result should be savings for the ratepayers or the loss of council employees' jobs. They cannot both be right.

Mr. Favell: Is my right hon. Friend aware that hon. Members are being inundated with literature from the metropolitan county councils saying why they should be saved? The latest literature from the GLC announces that it is setting up a briefing point at County Hall. Should not that expense be borne by the political parties that are seeking to save the skin of those white elephants, rather than by the hard-pressed ratepayers?

Mr. Jenkin: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. To add insult to injury, those ratepayers are having to pay for propaganda—particularly in London—against a proposal for which they voted in unprecedented numbers.

Mr. Meadowcroft: Given the Secretary of State's comments about the west midlands, will he have the confidence to publish more comprehensive information about the financial savings that he believes can be made so that they can be considered by hon. Members on both sides of the House?

Mr. Jenkin: It would not make sense to try to put a figure on the savings until the district councils have considered in detail how they will finance and staff the services for which they will become responsible, either individually or jointly. They are now considering that, and I am encouraged by the information coming forward.

Dr. Cunningham: Does the Secretary of State agree that his proposals to abolish the metropolitan counties and the GLC run contrary to almost all local government practice among the western industrial nations that face the problems of conurbations? Does he realise that his proposals have hardly any supporters in the local government associations? The proposals will cause unnecessary dislocation of essential services. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that, in addition, the proposals will result in control over those services being removed from the democratic process? They will be overseen by rate-raising quangos—[Interruption]—which may result in half a dozen rate bills dropping on each doormat. Given the right hon. Gentleman's comments about the GLC, does he recall writing to the Herbert commission, expressing his support for the GLC and saying that there should be a progressive return to the concept of the GLC being a strategic authority?

Mr. Jenkin: In the course of his somewhat lengthy question the hon. Gentleman has been guilty of more inaccurate statements than I would have believed possible. He knows perfectly well that there will not be a large number of rate demands. Our policy on that is clear in the

White paper on rates. As a result of the letter to which the hon. Gentleman referred, the Herbert commission pointed out to me fairly sharply that when it had reported on local government in Greater London it had at no stage used the word "strategic".

Dr. Cunningham: But the right hon. Gentleman did.

Mr. Jenkin: Yes, but the answer is that I was proved wrong.

Rates

Mr. Eastham: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment when he expects to introduce legislation to implement his proposals on rate capping.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: I hope to do so before Christmas.

Mr. Eastham: Is it not a fact that the Association of Metropolitan Authorities, the Association of County Councils and the Association of District Councils are all condemning the Government because of their attitude to rate capping? I am talking about Conservative-controlled as well as Labour-controlled authorities. Are not the Government creating the conditions for overspending by reducing the rate support grant from the 66·5 per cent. of only a few years ago to the proposed figure of 52 per cent.? That will affect the very inner city areas and partnership schemes which the Government say they support. In those areas there is the highest level of poverty and unemployment and the worst housing. They are the very areas that need Government support.

Mr. Jenkin: We made it clear at the election and in our manifesto that we would take action to control the high rates of those local authorities that spend irresponsibly and excessively. There is no doubt that their ratepayers are very anxious to see an end to that. I am coming under pressure to take action sooner rather than later.

Mr. Charles Morrison: Nevertheless, will my right hon. Friend take full account of the strong opposition expressed by most Conservatives in local government to his proposals as they have been presented to us? Will he note that elected local representatives in Conservative-controlled councils are just as concerned with the interests of ratepayers as he is?

Mr. Jenkin: My hon. Friend will have read the White Paper carefully and will know that the vast majority of councils that have done their best to keep their spending within the Government's guidelines have nothing whatever to fear from the selective rate capping proposals that I have put forward. Indeed, they have much to gain. I am being criticised because the autumn statement had to cut back the capital spending of local authorities on housing, and so on, because the current spending of local authorities had so far exceeded the guidelines which the House approved in the public expenditure White Paper. If we can cap the rates of the overspenders, the majority of councils can perhaps move into less turbulent waters.

Mr. Park: Would the right hon. Gentleman care to comment on the opposition that he found the other day in the Tory-controlled Warwickshire county council, when he had a private meeting?

Mr. Jenkin: I think that at the end of the meeting there was a much better understanding of how a council such as Warwickshire, which has budgeted responsibly over the


years, would gain if we could bring under control the overspending of the few authorities which spend far in excess of targets. A council such as Warwickshire would stand to gain from that.

Mr. Hickmet: Can my right hon. Friend offer any hope to ratepayers in local authorities such as Humberside county council, who face the prospect of a very significant rate rise in the next financial year because of the loss of rate support grant for next year? Can my right hon. Friend offer them any hope prior to the introduction of his legislatiion?

Mr. Jenkin: If the councillors of Humberside county council tailor their spending to the targets that the Government have set, there is hope. The responsibility lies with them. However, the county council would be unwise to proceed with projects that could only increase the burden on its unfortunate rateapayers.

Dr. Cunningham: Is it not a unique achievement that the Secretary of State has united all three local government associations against his proposals? Do not his proposals mean that rate levels and local authority budgets will be dictated essentially from Whitehall? Are we not seeing the dictatorship of central Government over local government? Will that not result in more damage to services in many communities where people are already under severe strain as a result of the Government's policies?

Mr. Jenkin: I have much respect for the hon. Gentleman, but he is indulging in absurd hyperbole. There is no dicatatorship in the Government taking steps to ensure that the public spending guidelines, which are approved each year by the House, are observed by local government. Commercial and domestic ratepayers in areas of high rating local authorities are worried and have been calling for the Government to take such action for their protection.

Amusement Centres

Mr. Ottaway: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment what plans he has to revise the development control policy note on amusement centres.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Neil Macfarlane): This development control policy note is currently under review and I hope to issue a revised version before long, which will be the subject of the customary consultation.

Mr. Ottaway: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that answer. As every decision by the city of Nottingham planning dept not to authorise the opening of an amusement arcade has been overturned by the Department's planning inspectors, in spite of local petitions, the wishes of local councillors and a forecast by local traders of the impact on shops, does he agree that the wishes of the local community should be borne in mind in the revised note?

Mr. Macfarlane: I note what my hon. Friend has said. I understand the background to the problem that has affected his constituents. That is why we are promoting the issue urgently. I hope that the consultations can be concluded early in the new year and that that will satisfy my hon. Friend's constituents.

Tameside

Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment whether, in view of the conclusions in the publication by the metropolitan borough of Tameside "Tameside: the Case for Aid" a copy of which has been sent to him, he will make available new assistance for Tameside.

Sir George Young: Tameside's case will be studied in the context of other relevant evidence and the claims of other authorities. However, I would not wish to raise hopes of further changes so soon after the last review of designations under the Inner Urban Areas Act 1978. Tameside has been encouraged to submit bids for support under the traditional urban programme and the derelict land reclamation programme. Its recent applications are now being considered.

Mr. Bennett: How recently did a Minister from the Department of the Environment go to Tameside? Will the hon. Gentleman arrange to make a visit there soon to examine the area's many problems and explain why the people there appear to get no Government assistance, whereas neighbouring areas in Manchester and Oldham do?

Sir George Young: That is a generous invitation, which I unhesitatingly accept.

Local Authorities (Privatisation)

Mr. Dubs: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he is satisfied with the success of privatisation measures by local authorities.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. William Waldegrave): I am satisfied that contracting out has brought benefits to authorities which have tried it. I am not satisfied that enough authorities have done so.

Mr. Dubs: Is the Minister aware that, in my local authority area of Wandsworth, there is a positive avalanche of complaints about dirty streets and unemptied dustbins? Is he aware that the service is beset by industrial disputes and that even the Tory-controlled Wandsworth council has recently had to sack one of the private contractors? Is he further aware that Opposition Members will not be stilled by the practice of some contractors appointing ex-leaders of local authorities and present Tory Members of Parliament to their companies on retainers?

Mr. Waldegrave: I am aware that the contracting out of services in that borough will save the ratepayers about £10 million over the next few years. I am also aware that one of the strengths of contracting out is that if there is unsatisfactory performance, local authorities can find a new contractor.

Mr. Eggar: What is the rate per pound in Lambeth, and what is the rate per pound in Wandsworth?

Mr. Waldegrave: I am afraid that I do not have those figures to hand, but the implication of my hon. Friend's question is clear and correct.

Mr. Straw: Does the Minister realise that, in Conservative-controlled areas all over the country, there is increasing discontent with the services that have been privatised? Despite the fact that many of those companies


are major paymasters of the Tory party, will he have the courage to admit that, in many areas, privatisation has been a bad deal for the councils and an even worse one for ratepayers?

Mr. Waldegrave: That is a foolish line of argument because it makes people wonder whether the hon. Gentleman is speaking for some of the trade unions which are paymasters of his party. There is no widespread dissatisfaction such as he mentioned. On the contrary, ratepayers have warmly welcomed the savings that have been achieved.

Later—

Mr. Hickmet: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. The hon. Member for Battersea (Mr. Dubs) implied in his question to my hon. Friend that those involved with the privatisation of local authority services and who are now Members of the House were in receipt of pay-offs from the companies that obtained the contracts. Will the hon. Gentleman tell the House what evidence he has to confirm that statement. If he has none, will he withdraw the statement?

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member draws attention to a legitimate point. If the hon. Member for Battersea (Mr. Dubs) had intended to impute any dishonour to any Member of the House on either side, I am sure that he will wish to withdraw the allegation.

Mr. Dubs: I thank the hon. Member for Blandford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Hickmet) for warning me that he would raise this point of order. I have to rely on my memory of what I said until we have the record before us. If the House will allow me, I shall clarify the position. I said that the Opposition would not be satisfied even if the contractors put on retainers the leaders of local authorities which had privatised local authority services. In saying that I was in no way intending to imply anything dishonourable. I was anticipating what the annual Members' Declaration of Interests would show when it was published. If that document had been available, I should have quoted from it. I was seeking to do no more or less than that.

Mr. Skinner: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. Does the House not accept that if, as a result of privatisation, some of the bodies, such as Exclusive Cleaning and others, which are run by Tories for Tories, obtain additional contracts and are able to set other Tory Members on retainers, that would mean that they were lining their pockets? Is it not justifiable to say that in the House?

Mr. Speaker: Order. All Members of the House are honourable in their dealings. Let us leave it at that.

Green Belt

Mr. Hal Miller: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment whether he has issued any clarification of his draft circular to local authorities on green belt policy; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: I refer my hon. Friend to the speech made by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Macfarlane) in the Adjournment debate on Friday 18 November 1983. I am considering the many useful comments made on the draft circular. I can assure my hon. Friend that I am as committed as any of my predecessors to preserving a strong green belt policy.

Mr. Miller: I thank my right hon. Friend for that assurance. Is he aware of the deep anxiety in my district and county about an especially vulnerable area of green belt in north Worcestershire, which is subject to attack from neighbouring authorities which are making proposals in their structure plans for development in our area? Is he further aware that there is anxiety about my hon. Friend the Minister calling in an application for development on the ground that more houses, rather than fewer, should be built in the green belt?

Mr. Jenkin: I have already made it abundantly clear that the draft circular is intended to strengthen, not weaken, green belt policy. I have taken careful note of the many comments made by my hon. Friend and others. I recognise their anxieties and am considering whether it would be right to issue a second draft circular so that there can be no doubt about the Government being committed to a strong green belt policy.

Mr. Cartwright: Does the Secretary of State agree that one of the most effective ways in which to reduce pressure on green belts is to encourage greater public and private investment in cities? Does he agree also that improving the quality of life there would reduce the pressure on people to find a better environment beyond the city limits?

Mr. Jenkin: I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Flannery: Do it then.

Mr. Jenkin: We are doing it. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will visit the enormously successful London docklands development. Between 1975 and 1982, two houses were built for sale. Now, thousands of houses which are being built are being sold before they get to the footings. It is one of the most successful examples of inner-city regeneration. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will take the trouble to visit it. Perhaps he will advise his local authority to do the same sort of thing.

Mr. David Howell: Does my right hon. Friend appreciate that the problem is not so much his underlying intentions, but the ambiguity of the original draft circular about the concept of the green belt? Will he take that into account in any redrafting? Will he accept that, when examining the pressure on housing in the south-east, his first priority should be—I think that he just said this—to look to the eastern side of Greater London, where there is room for a whole new city? Does he agree that he should look there rather than put additional pressures to develop on green belt land?

Mr. Jenkin: I accept my right hon. Friend's criticism. The original draft was widely misunderstood. That is why I think it might be sensible to issue a second one to make the matter abundantly clear.
On my right hon. Friend's second point, I draw his attention to the extremely important letter that I wrote to my noble Friend Lord Sandford as chairman of the Standing Conference on London and South-East Regional Planning about the effect of the M25. We intend that that road will shift some of the heavy pressure on the west of London to the east of London, where there is indeed ample room for development. I commend that letter to my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Penhaligon: How many of the Secretary of State's right hon. and hon. Friends opposed the original draft as they understood it?

Mr. Jenkin: The hon. Gentleman will know that, rightly, a number of my hon. Friends expressed the anxieties of their constituents because there had been some wild misrepresentations in some quarters about what we announced, and now that our intentions are clear I am sure that my hon. Friends will be enormously reassured.

Sir Dudley Smith: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there are good reasons why there should be a relaxation on building in some areas? At the same time, as has been said, there are real and grave doubts about the erosion of the green belt. In the circumstances, is my right hon. Friend aware that his announcement today will be welcome, and will he make it clear and explicit that there is no intention of eroding the green belt as we know it?

Mr. Jenkin: I am happy to give my hon. Friend that specific expression of our intentions.

Consultative Council on Local Government Finance

Mr. Dixon: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment whether he proposes convening the statutory meeting of the Consultative Council on Local Government Finance in December.

Mr. Waldegrave: My right hon. Friend hopes to arrange a meeting of the council on 14 December to announce details of the rate support grant settlement for 1984–85.

Mr. Dixon: Is it not a fact that the arbitrary spending ceilings and penalties imposed by the Government on local authorities, including my local authority of South Tyneside, which has had £2 million stolen from it in rate support grant over the past three years, have driven up rates and savaged local authority services? In view of the Secretary of State for the Environment's continuous assault on local democracy, will the hon. Gentleman undertake to make a statement to the House before he meets the council on 14 December so that right hon. and hon. Members will have the opportunity to question him on the cutting down of home helps, the closing of nursery schools and old people's homes and the stopping of meals on wheels?

Mr. Waldegrave: My right hon. Friend will be putting the rate support grant settlement before the House in due course in the normal way. I reject the implications of what the hon. Gentleman said. If money has been unfairly taken by anybody, it has been taken by high-spending authorities from those that are more responsible.

Environmental Policy

Mr. Marlow: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment what powers have been acquired by the Commission of the European Communities either through the Treaty of Rome or other means over United Kingdom environmental policies.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: None, Sir, by the Commission.

Mr. Marlow: Is it not the case that as well as running our agricultural policy and our trade policy from Brussels, directives are now being issued on our planning policy? Given the disastrous CAP and the less than successful trade policy, will my right hon. Friend make it his business to stop any empire-building by the Brussels megalomaniacs with regard to our environmental policy?

Mr. Jenkin: It is now over 11 years since the Heads of Government of the EC, in the European Council agreed on the importance of a Community environmental policy, and since then the Community has adopted successive environmental action programmes, the most recent one being last February, covering the period from 1982 to 1986. It is my belief that this European policy on the environment is widely supported by many people within the Community.

Local Government Act 1972

Mr. Gerald Howarth: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment when he intends to bring forward proposals for the reform of section 137 of the Local Government Act 1972.

Mr. Waldegrave: My right hon. Friend is considering whether action is needed and practicable, in the light of the study published recently by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy.

Mr. Howarth: Does my hon. Friend agree that there is great public concern in the country about the abuse of section 137, the 2p rate, particularly in the metropolis, where funds are being given by the GLC to bodies more worthy of private than public support? Can my hon. Friend confirm that action will be taken as soon as possible by the Government to ensure that, at a time when ratepayers are so hard pressed, their funds will not be whittled away in this squandering fashion?

Mr. Waldegrave: I agree that there are places in the country where the power has been used not in the way in which Parliament originally intended it to be used.

Mr. Flannery: Name them.

Mr. Waldegrave: I can name the Greater London council and Islington council. The difficulty is that there are many worthy schemes supported by the same powers, and the matter is difficult to sort out.

Mr. Wareing: Does the Minister recognise that section 137 has been the means by which Merseyside, through the Labour-controlled Merseyside county council, has generated 6,000 jobs in small industry and co-operative enterprises? Is not one of the great concerns of people on Merseyside that the Government's proposals for the metropolitan counties, and the possible proposals for section 137, would destroy any prospects of jobs being so generated?

Mr. Waldegrave: It is true that in various parts of the country the section 137 power has been used to support the Government's urban development grant initiative and other worthy projects. It is misuse in other places that threatens section 137.

Mr. Robert B. Jones: I have noticed that many Labour-controlled authorities have advertised in Labour Weekly for recruiting officers. Will my hon. Friend consider amending section 137 as a major means of preventing Labour-controlled authorities from using it to subsidise their own party from public funds and thus make it absolutely certain that they recruit Socialists?

Mr. Waldegrave: It is clear that if section 137 were used for party political purposes that would be open to legal challenge.

Mr. Loyden: Does the Minister agree that the local authorities to which he referred were democratically elected on the basis of a manifesto which they placed before the people, and will he come clean on whether it is the Government's intention, and that of his right hon. Friend, to interfere with democratically elected members of local authorities and impose the Government's will on those authorities?

Mr. Waldegrave: I fear that a large number of the sillier section 137 projects were not put before the electorate.

Home Repair Grants

Mr. Penhaligon: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment whether all applications for home repair grants that are made to the relevant local authority by 31 March 1984 and subsequently approved will receive a 90 per cent. grant.

Sir George Young: All repair grant applications made by 31 March 1984 will continue to be eligible for the 90 per cent. maximum rate of grant now in force. The actual rate of any grant approved is at the discretion of the local authority.

Mr. Penhaligon: I assure the Minister that my constituents will be delighted with that reply. However, is he aware that one council in my constituency stopped taking applications in the second week of January this year, that another council has a waiting list of over 600, and that both councils say that they have no money? Is not the Minister's answer misleading my constituents into the belief that help exists when it does not?

Sir George Young: The reason why the councils have stopped giving the grants is not because they have no money, but because they do not know what the allocations will be next year. My right hon. Friend hopes to make a statement about the HIP allocations shortly. When the local authorities have that information they will be able to consider how much to spend on home improvement grants next year and, I hope, to start reprocessing applications.

Mr. Cowans: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May I seek your assistance? How can the Minister's first reply be correct if his second reply is correct? Is he not guilty of misleading the House?

Mr. Speaker: Order. Such points of order merely take up the time of the House.

Mr. Hicks: Can my hon. Friend give an assurance that the HIP allocation for 1984–85 for those local authorities that have had to suspend approving applications during the current financial year will be sufficient to cover those on the waiting lists, 2,000 in my constituency, plus those many applications that will come in between now and 31 March 1984?

Sir George Young: We always take into account the commitments which local authorities have already entered into when deciding what the allocations will be next year. My hon. Friend has made forceful representations on behalf of his local authority and I shall try to ensure that the allocation next year not only covers the commitment but gives some leeway for the other things that local authorities want to do.
There was no inconsistency between my first and second replies. I said that applications were eligible for the

90 per cent. grant, but the local authority had discretion whether to give it. That was not inconsistent with what I subsquently said.

Mr. Concannon: The Minister must take this matter much more seriously. A local authority such as Mansfield allocates the money in the first month of the year, and the people of Mansfield know that it is a waste of time to apply for this year's grant. Will the Minister offer some advice to local authorities?

Sir George Young: It is because we take the matter seriously that last year £430 million was spent on improvement grants, compared with £90 million in the last year of the Labour Government.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton: Does my hon. Friend accept that repair and improvement grants are immense value for money and that they preserve our housing stock, which is cheaper and better than building new houses? Will he assure the House that the Government truly appreciate the value of improvement and repair grants, especially to towns and cities that were a part of the industrial revolution, not only because of the improvement to the housing stock, but because of the employment that it provides in the building and construction industry?

Sir George Young: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is no reason why the amount spent on improvement grants next year should not be the same as the amount spent last year—£430 million—which was a record.

Mr. John Fraser: If the Department is to cut housing expenditure next year by 20 per cent., unless the Minister can confirm that all local authorities will have enough money for 90 per cent. repair and improvement grants, without cutting their new building and other programmes, he is practising a cruel hoax on tens of thousands of owner-occupiers and tens of thousands of tenants who live in premises with the minimum amenities and in the worst state of repair. Does he agree that some of the statements made by his right hon. Friend are worthy of the probity of a confidence trickster?

Sir George Young: I strongly reject the hon. Gentleman's latter assertion. I also reject the statement that he made at the beginning of his remarks. In cash terms, the provision that we have made for housing next year is comparable to that of this year.

Sports Council

Mr. Moynihan: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment what matters he intends to raise at his next meeting with the Sports Council.

Mr. Macfarlane: My hon. Friend, as a member of the Sports Council, will be aware of the number and variety of issues with which the Sports Council is involved and which I discuss at my regular meetings with the council's chairman. The agenda for my next meeting has yet to be fixed, but it may include such issues as sports sponsorship, regional boundaries, sports medicine, grant-aid for 1984–85, inner-city facilities, regional arenas, the Olympic games, appointments, and recreation management training.

Mr. Moynihan: Will my hon. Friend also bring to the attention of the Sports Council the excellent European initiative that he recently pioneered to handle the appalling


problem of football hooliganism? Will he draw a distinction between football supporters and hooligans, who have no interest in the sport and who should be subjected to tougher sentencing by the courts?

Mr. Macfarlane: I am grateful for my hon. Friend's approval of what took place at the Rotterdam conference last week. I normally discuss such matters not with the chairman of the Sports Council, but with the Football Association and the Football League.

Mr. Ioan Evans: Will the Minister ensure that an additional item on the agenda is the preservation of the Gleneagles agreement on sporting contacts with South Africa, and will he dissuade sporting organisations from making contact with that apartheid regime?

Mr. Macfarlane: I discuss such matters from time to time with the chairman of the Sports Council. The Government's commitment to the Commonwealth declaration was reaffirmed by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and by myself in recent weeks.

Mr. Stokes: Is my hon. Friend aware that some Conservative Members doubt whether there is a need for a Sports Council at all, or even the need for a Minister responsible for sport? Having said that, if I were to occupy that position, I should insist that the Sports Council ensured that it protected the British spirit of fair play when we send spectators abroad.

Mr. Macfarlane: I am aware of the contribution that the regional council on sport and recreation makes to the many people of the west midlands, not least to the good people in my hon. Friend's constituency, who had the sense to return him here in June. I must tell him that I have duties other than being Minister with responsibility for sport.

Mr. McGuire: In view of the problem with football hooligans, will the Minister encourage the Sports Council to do everything in its power to persuade people to play rugby union football instead of soccer, if only because the players of that noble game are known to get their retaliation in first, and they go for each other instead of the spectators going for each other? If we can have more people playing rugby union, perhaps eventually they will move to the even more noble game of rugby league.

Mr. Macfarlane: There may be merit in what the hon. Gentleman says, but that route is fraught with risks and is a matter for the governing bodies.

Mr. Hayward: While my hon. Friend remains as Minister with responsibility for sport, and before the Sports Council is abolished, will he discuss with the council the medical support provided for the preparation of the Olympics team, so that we do not send a team to the Olympics next year that is ill-prepared or severely injured prior to the games?

Mr. Macfarlane: The House must understand that there is no intention to abolish that most important and august body, the Sports Council, which does much important work. I have discussed those matters in close detail with the chairman of the Sports Council and with the chairman of the British Olympics Association, but the role of the governing bodies in this is critical.

Dr. Cunningham: Will the Minister assure the Sports Council that the money raised by the British Olympics

appeal will not be taxed? Will he also reconsider his response to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Mr. Evans) about the importance of the Gleneagles agreement, which is being breached in spirit and in reality by teams coming to Britain and by proposals that British teams should visit South Africa?

Mr. Nicholas Winterton: The more that come and go the better.

Mr. Macfarlane: The hon. Gentleman's first question is important. The chairman of the Sports Council and I discuss South Africa and a range of other important issues, which will be on the agenda of the next meeting.

Mr. Hickmet: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I give notice that I intend to raise a point of order at 3.30 pm arising from implications in the question of the hon. Member for Battersea (Mr. Dubs).

Mr. Speaker: Order. It is a bad habit to raise points of order in the middle of Question Time.

Private Sector Rented Houses

Mr. Squire: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment whether he has any plans to seek to expand the private rented sector; and if he will make a statement.

The Minister for Housing and Construction (Mr. Ian Gow): The Government wish the private rented sector to fulfil its important role in meeting housing needs, particularly those of the young, the single and the mobile. I am considering how we might improve the Rent Acts, with a view to enabling the private sector to meet more effectively the demand for homes to rent.

Mr. Squire: I thank my hon. Friend for that reply. Does he agree that in many inner cities the only place where the young and mobile have a genuine choice is in the private sector? Will he consider some of the informed criticism of the present assured tenancy scheme made by people such as Clive Thornton? Does he agree that if changes were implemented there would be a dramatic increase in property coming on to the private rented market?

Mr. Gow: There has been an encouraging response to our new assured tenancies scheme and we wish to build on its initial success. It is precisely because I realise that for many people there is a great opportunity in the private rented sector that I am reviewing existing legislation. Too much of the legislation that was designed to help tenants in the private sector has succeeded only in drying up the supply of the accommodation that we need.

Mr. Winnick: Is the Minister aware that any change that would weaken security of tenure would be a great and damaging blow to private tenants? Is he further aware that there is considerable anxiety about the way in which the Berger group of companies treats its tenants? Will he take every possible step to investigate the serious allegations made about the Berger group, and will he report to the House as quickly as possible?

Mr. Gow: If the hon. Gentleman will put in writing the allegations that he has made on the Floor of the House, I shall investigate them fully. If he really cared about those who require accommodation, he would welcome the review that I have just announced.

Mr. Dykes: Does my hon. Friend agree that there is another aspect of legislation that needs to be looked at, and that is giving more confidence to this sector by making sure that tenants have a legal right to know who the landlord really is—the real owner, not just the agent?

Mr. Gow: I accept the force of what my hon. Friend says.

Precast Concrete Houses

Mr. Ashdown: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment what, according to his best estimate, is the total number of all types of precast reinforced concrete council houses, other than those of Airey construction, in the United Kingdom.

Sir George Young: It is estimated that in the United Kingdom there are about 146,900 precast reinforced concrete houses similar in design to the 24,250 houses of the Airey type. In addition, it is estimated that there are another 230,000 precast reinforced concrete dwellings, mainly flats, which have been built since 1960, almost all to designs different from those which were the subject of my hon. Friend's statement on 10 November.

Mr. Ashdown: I thank the Minister for giving those figures. Does he realise that a substantial number of people are living in PRC houses of a type not yet commented on by the Building Research Establishment? There are about 300 in my constituency alone. Does he realise that many of those people are suffering, in that they cannot either buy or sell their houses. Will he say when the next BRE report will be published, bearing in mind that the last one was promised in three months and took 10? If the BRE report were to identify problems similar to previous ones, will the people not so far commented on receive the same assistance as has been announced today?

Sir George Young: When we have the BRE report we shall be able to make a judgment on the matter. If the statutory criteria of the existing scheme are met, it will be possible for the local authority to exercise its discretion to help owners of houses which were not specified by my hon. Friend in his statement but which, none the less, meet the criteria. It may help to put the matter in context if I say that there is no widespread evidence of serious defects in the non-traditional houses built after 1960.

Mr. John Fraser: Are people who live in seriously defective system-built slums regarded by the hon. Gentleman's Department as being in special housing need or just general housing need?

Sir George Young: It would be a matter for the local authority, as the owner of the buildings, to decide what priority to give in transfers to people living in difficult conditions. It would also be up to the local authority to make sensible use of its housing investment programmes to put the problem right.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton: My hon. Friend clearly understands the great problems of people living in these houses. Will he assure us, in the case of people who live in Airey houses that are still owned by the local authority, as compared with those that have been purchased from the local authority, that proper account will be taken by the Government in allocating housing resources so that the houses can be repaired with the same element of grant as is the case with houses purchased by people who were previously council house tenants.

Sir George Young: As my hon. Friend will know, the method of financing repairs would be different if the repairs were carried out by a local authority, as opposed to a private owner. I assure my hon. Friend that we took into account the obligations of local authorities when we calculated their housing investment programme allocations for next year.

Land Disposal

Mr. Heddle: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he is satisfied with the rate of disposal by public authorities of land on the land registers.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: No, Sir, I am not satisfied. While many public bodies are doing well, some are not. I intend to step up the pressure and will, where necessary, use my powers to direct a disposal.

Mr. Heddle: I welcome my right hon. Friend's answer. Does he agree that many Labour-controlled authorities are, regrettably, sitting on urban land, inner-city land, which builders would like to be released to enable them to build homes for first-time buyers? Will he take urgent steps to implement the powers given to him under section 98 of the Local Government, Planning and Land Act to enable those local authorities to release the land forthwith?

Mr. Jenkin: I entirely accept the premise of my hon. Friend's question. When attention is drawn to a piece of land that is in the possession of the local authority it has always proved possible so far to persuade the local authority to sell, rather than to use my powers. I have made it clear, and I make it clear again today, that if there is unreasonable delay I shall not hesitate to use those powers.

Mr. Freeson: Is it not true that the building industry's organisations have made it clear, both privately and publicly, that most of the land that is publicly owned and on the register is not suitable for most development, including large-scale housing development, and that one of the main reasons is that large areas of the land do not have infrastructure services? Does the Secretary of State accept that the only way to get most of the land into use is for the Government to provide more capital to local authorities, and thus get the sites serviced and possibly made available for housing and other purposes?

Mr. Jenkin: I am sure the right hon. Gentleman knows that large parts of the land are not suitable for housing in large quantities. About 10,000 acres that have been identified as suitable for housing are in the possession of public authorities, and another 10,000 acres may be suitable if planning permission were available. We are concerned to ensure that that land, most of which is in inner-city areas, is made available and we are prepared to help the housing industry to acquire the land wherever possible.

Mr. Michael Forsyth: Will my right hon. Friend instruct the London boroughs and the metropolitan districts to enter on the registers publicly owned land that is less than an acre in area?

Mr. Jenkin: At the moment the registers do not include land of less than an acre. It is a question whether the additional administration that would be involved in


registering smaller areas would be commensurate with the advantage that would be given. However, I assure my hon. Friend that I have the matter in mind.

Local Authorities (Financial Penalties)

Mr. Robert Atkins: asked the Secretary of State for the Environment how many local authorities within the county of Lancashire will fall into penalty as a result of policies in 1982–83.

Mr. Waldegrave: Nine out of the 14 district authorities within the county of Lancashire overspent their effective targets in 1982–83 and therefore incurred grant holdback. Eight are budgeting to spend above their expenditure targets for 1983–84 and are, therefore, subject to grant holdback this year.

Mr. Atkins: Does my hon. Friend not think it extraordinary that the borough of South Ribble, which is the lowest-rated authority in the county of Lancashire, and which has done everything required of it by his Department, should now be penalised? It feels extremely aggrieved at that prospect. Would my hon. Friend be prepared to accept, or to advise his right hon. Friend to accept, a delegation from that council so that it can put its point of view to him?

Mr. Waldegrave: South Ribble's provisional target for 1984–85 is almost 15 per cent. higher than its 1982–83 budget. However one measures inflation, that is a real increase. I repeat that the need for savings from low-spending authorities derives, in part, from the inability so far to control the high spenders. That is why we need the powers that my right hon. Friend mentioned earlier. I think I have explained to my hon. Friend that we are now too near the rate support grant settlement to be expected to receive further delegations.

Mr. Haynes: Surely the Minister realises that authorities are overspending because of Government policy? When will the Government learn the lesson? It is all very well for the Secretary of State to laugh, but it is not a joke. It is a serious matter. When will the Government and the Department realise that local

authorities are required to provide services that were promised at the election, but that the Government's policies are preventing them from doing so?

Mr. Waldegrave: The Government were re-elected with a greatly increased majority on a ticket which said that they would control public expenditure. A number of local authorities have followed a policy that has flown in the face of that re-endorsed mandate.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: Will my hon. Friend ensure that in the efforts—which all Conservative Members support—to control grossly spendthrift councils he does not accidentally penalise those councils that have been prudent over the years?

Mr. Waldegrave: As I have said before, part of the reason why it is still necessary to ask so much from the lower spenders is that we still face the problem of the high spenders breaking through. That is why my right hon. Friend needs the powers that he will seek in the House.

Mr. Straw: Do not the examples of the South Ribble council and all the other Lancashire councils show just how capricious and arbitrary is the Government's system of rate limitation? Does it not show that the real reason why rates have risen in Lancashire and elsewhere is not alleged overspending but the £2,000 million that the Government have imposed on the ratepayers of the country—expenditure which was paid for by central taxation? Will the Minister admit that, despite that additional burden, rates have risen far less than taxes, local government expenditure has risen less rapidly than central Government expenditure, and that even alleged high-spending authorities have seen their expenditure rise more slowly—for example the GLC's has risen by only 88 per cent.—than that of central Government, which has risen by 101 per cent.? Will the Minister admit that central Government are the overspenders?

Mr. Waldegrave: The hon. Gentleman has failed to understand the point. Central Government cut the percentage of aggregate grant because they wanted local authorities to cut spending. Rates have increased because local authorities have not responded and cut expenditure, which is why my right hon. Friend has to seek further powers.

Messenger Group Newspapers

Mr. Speaker: Before calling the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Montgomery) to ask a private notice question, I must tell the House that I understand that the trade union in dispute with the Messenger Group Newspapers has been ordered by the High Court to appear before it on Friday regarding non-payment of a fine. The Messenger Group has issued a writ for sequestration, which will be heard at the same time. I must, therefore, disallow any reference in questions to these matters before the court as being sub judice.

Mr. Fergus Montgomery: (by private notice) asked the Secretary of State for Employment whether he would make a statement about the industrial dispute with Messenger Group Newspapers.

The Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Tom King): As the House will know, there has been a dispute over the past year between the Stockport Messenger Group Newspapers and the National Graphical Association in connection with the establishment of closed shop agreements at the firm's subsidiaries at Warrington and Bury. As a result of action taken by the union during the dispute, the Messenger Group sought an injunction against the union in the High Court. The injunction was granted requiring the union to desist from organising unlawful industrial action. The court subsequently found that the injunction was not being observed and imposed a fine of £50,000 on the National Graphical Association for breach of that injunction. The fine has not been paid, and I understand that the High Court has now directed that it wishes to deal with the non-payment of the fine on Friday of this week.
As the House will also know, there have been intermittent incidents of intimidatory picketing at different plants culminating in the mass picket at Warrington last night. One policeman was seriously injured. I understand that a number of arrests have been made. Criminal charges have already been brought against those involved in earlier incidents and further charges may be made against those arrested last night.
In connection with the substance of the dispute, the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service has already been involved in seeking to assist the parties to a resolution of this dispute. I understand that the conciliation service is seeking to arrange a further meeting of the parties very shortly.
Whatever the arguments in relation to the dispute, I hope that both sides of the House will join with me in deploring the disgraceful behaviour that occurred at Warrington last night and to reaffirm that such conduct has no place in industrial relations in this country, and that the law must be observed.

Mr. Montgomery: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the workers were offered the choice of joining the National Graphical Association, that the union had a chance to put its case, and that after a secret ballot the workers decided that they did not want to join the union? Is my right hon. Friend further aware that the union has accepted that point?
On Sunday there was a 13-hour meeting between the two parties and ACAS. The point of difficulty seems to be

the re-employment of the six people who withdrew their labour. That difficulty has arisen because the other employees in the organisation are not happy to have those people back—[Interruption.]—because for 20 weeks people have suffered harassment and intimidation from those people and the other union bullyboys. Why did we enact the Employment Act 1982 if it is to be ignored by such people? I hope that the Government will make their position clear, because a small firm is being intimidated by a union.

Mr. King: Had it not been for the 1980 and 1982 Acts, the Messenger Group would have had no recourse against the secondary picketing that took place, and the attempts to breach other contracts, which were part of the substance of the complaint to the court in respect of which the injunction was granted.
I know that my hon. Friend will also accept that, whatever be the system of law, it has been accepted by every party in the House and by successive parties when in government that picketing is lawful only when it is peaceful. Intimidation and obstruction are criminal offences, and the law must be observed.

Mr. John Smith: Does the Secretary of State agree that a politically inspired private notice question does not help the solution of a sensitive industrial dispute? [Interruption.] Hon. Gentlemen who proclaim the rule of law should listen to criticism in reasonable silence. Is the Secretary of State aware that the Opposition deplore violence and extend their sympathy to anyone affected by it? Will he equally recognise that the National Graphical Association issued a leaflet to those involved in the dispute? I quote from it:
On behalf of the Organising Committee it is requested that the demonstration remains peaceful and you are asked not to attack the building or be provoked into using violence.
Does the Secretary of State accept, if he can hear me above the interruptions from behind him, that the trade union involved acted responsibly in giving that advice to its members? [Interruption.] May I say in the presence of the Secretary of State that the conduct of Conservative Members is not consistent with the type of order that they proclaim to those involved in industrial disputes?
The substance of the dispute is the serious matter with which all those involved in settling it are concerned. Does the Secretary of State accept that it is an extremely serious dispute with the potential for spreading rapidly throughout this sector of British industry? Is not the dispute within the area of settlement as what is now at stake is no more than the jobs of the six NGA members who were dismissed by Mr. Shah?
Is not the most important part of the Secretary of State's statement his reference to the ACAS meeting? Should he not now revive the old Ministry of Labour tradition of putting the Government's weight behind conciliation and the resolution of the dispute as early as possible?

Mr. King: I am sure that the whole House will hope that the further meeting that ACAS is seeking to arrange will be helpful in resolving the core of the dispute. While the original substance of the dispute is important and its resolution will help to remove this problem, I cannot walk away as readily as the right hon. and learned Gentleman from the events of last night and the type of behaviour that took place.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman accused my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr.


Montgomery) of asking a politically motivated question, as though he is supposed to ignore the incidents that took place last night and on earlier occasions affecting his constituency and constituents. The right hon. and learned Gentleman knows that I referred to the intermittent disputes at the various plants and to the seriousness of this matter. I hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman was not equivocating in any way on what I took to be his categoric denial of violence in picketing. I am pleased to say that I understand that the TUC has also issued a statement condemning the use of violence. I hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman and his right hon. Friends will lend their good offices to ensure that every effort is made to prevent any recurrence of this type of action.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. Before I call another hon. Member to speak, I should say that a private notice question is an extension of Question Time. I propose to allow questions on this statement to continue until 3.55 pm. We have a further statement and an Opposition day debate thereafter.

Mr. Tim Rathbone: Does my right hon. Friend accept that the forces of law must be sufficient to meet the needs of the law? Is he reassured that the law as it stands is sufficient in its scope to meet episodes such as this and that the forces of law, particularly the police force complement, are large enough and well enough trained to meet incidents such as that which occurred the other evening?

Mr. King: That is not a matter for me. It is first the responsibility of the chief constable concerned. My hon. Friend will wish to pay tribute to the fact that, after the first problems the police encountered, they took the necessary steps to ensure that the mass picketing and the obstruction and intimidation did not prevent the progress of the business.

Mr. Doug Hoyle: First, does the Secretary of State accept that the constituency involved is not that of the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Montgomery) but is my constituency and that his hon. Friend is interfering in my constituency without even having the decency to tell me that he proposed to table this question? Is not the bully boy in this case the employer, because he brought in paramilitary thugs with dogs, which inflamed passions? Is not that the reason why violence occurred?
Secondly, does the right hon. Gentleman accept that there could be an agreement? The right hon. Gentleman has admitted that the union has been flexible and that the TUC is backing the union in this dispute. Is he aware that if only the employer would stop victimising the six members and reinstate them the dispute could be over tomorrow?

Mr. King: I recognise, and I sought to make it clear—I think the hon. Gentleman heard me say it—that the company is affected at three plants in three constituencies. A number of hon. Members are affected, and, indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Montgomery) has already taken the trouble to raise the matter on the Adjournment. I do not know whether the hon. Member for Warrington, North (Mr. Hoyle) took part in that debate. I shall not enter today into the merits of the

dispute, which I hope can be discussed at ACAS and resolved. However, it distresses me that the hon. Member for Warrington, North can speak but utter not a single word of criticism or deprecation about the scenes of violence, which have no part in proper industrial relations in this country.

Sir Kenneth Lewis: Does my right hon. Friend agree that many of the pickets at the factory gates came from other parts of the country and, in fairness to the NGA, were probably members of other unions? Is it not against the principles of picketing and an abuse of the law that they should do that?

Mr. King: As the company involved employs only 120 people, it is clear that a picket of 1,000 or more must be a breach of the law. It is well known and has been accepted by Governments of both parties that intimidation and obstruction are criminal offences that have no place in peaceful picketing.

Mr. Ron Leighton: As a member of a separate print trade union, Sogat '82, I should like to ask the Secretary of State whether he recognises that we are dealing with an employer who reneges on agreements. Secondly, does he appreciate that the NGA has bent over backwards to reach agreement in this case to the extent that it has reached a provisional agreement, a copy of which I have with me, that all employees at Bury and Warrington will stay in their jobs and only new employees will be members of the union? Thirdly, is he aware that the seven members of the NUJ who took industrial action have been taken back by the employer but that he is refusing to take back six members of the NGA? That is the sole issue in dispute. I urge the right hon. Gentleman to use his offices of conciliation to get an agreement to take those six men back. Would it not be a pity to have industrial Armageddon over six men?
If those principally concerned go down the road of stealing the property of the union and seeking to destroy it, not only will that be bad for industrial relations—do not expect any more copies of Hansard or newspapers—but the state will be biting off more than it can chew.

Mr. King: I know enough about the background of the dispute to know that every one of the statements that the hon. Gentleman has made to the House is itself the subject of bitter argument in this controversy. That reinforces my judgment that I do not propose at the Dispatch Box to comment on any of his remarks.

Mr. Tony Speller: May I remind my right hon. Friend that there are victims well beyond this internecine war? The public will be deprived of the newspapers and titles that they are used to, retail distributors and newsagents will suffer financial loss, and, as usual, the public will suffer. On seeking to resolve the dispute, will my right hon. Friend remember the public interest, which is paramount in all things?

Mr. King: There are procedures and ways in which disputes of this type can be resolved and should be resolved without industrial action but, if it takes place, it should at least be conducted within the law. What is unacceptable to the people of this country is that people should refuse to observe the law.

Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: Is the Minister aware that there is mounting anger in Stockport over the fact that this dispute could have been settled by


agreement at the beginning of the week had Mr. Shah not refused to take back the six workers in Stockport, in my constituency, who throughout this period have observed the law and picketed in the most respectable way? Will the Government now use their good offices to persuade Mr. Shah to reinstate the six people and thereby have the whole dispute settled? Will the right hon. Gentleman remember that the reason why these people are not being allowed to go back are the blacklegs who have been recruited since and who object to them returning to work?

Mr. King: The House will have heard my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Montgomery) refer to allegations about the conduct of some of the members of the firm who were affected in that way, and the question of their reinsatement obviously arouses considerable controversy. I shall not enter into that because that matter is, I understand, now at the heart of the resolution of the problem. ACAS is giving the matter its close attention and is seeking to arrange a meeting, and I shall not enter into the pros and cons of it at this stage. I say unequivocally that, whatever be the pros and cons in terms of the original dispute, illegal and intimidatory action of the kind we have seen and criminal behaviour are intolerable.

Sir Dudley Smith: However big or small the case, will my right hon. Friend confirm that in a true democracy the law, and the will of Parliament which passes the law of the country, must in the end prevail?

Mr. King: That is what I have been seeking to reinforce to the House today. The trade unions enjoy certain rights and privileges—whatever title one gives them—of immunity under the law and are protected by the law, and it is as much in their interest in the long run that the law should be observed by others; they should insist that their members also observe the law. I trust that the TUC, having condemned violent behaviour, will take every possible step to ensure that no such events occur again.

Mr. Norman Atkinson: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: I would rather not take a point of order at this moment.

Mr. Atkinson: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I wish to refer to your ruling—

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Atkinson: —when you ruled—

Hon. Members: Sit down.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I said that this was an extension of Question Time. It will take time out of that if I take points of order at this stage. If the hon. Gentleman wishes to raise a point of order, I will take it afterwards.

Mr. Atkinson: On a point of order,—

Mr. Speaker: Very well, but I must tell the hon. Member that taking his point of order now is taking time out of the private notice question.

Mr. Atkinson: I hope that you will allow the time, Mr. Speaker, because my point of order relates to an important

matter on which you have ruled. You said that it was sub judice to refer to charges which are to come before the court. However, that did not prevent the Minister from out of hand condemning workers in relation to charges on which they have not yet appeared before any court. The Minister said that those workers were already guilty[Interruption.]—and he asked Opposition Members to condemn their behaviour as though they had already been found guilty of those offences. Should you not prevent the Minister from referring to that issue, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: The Minister has not talked about the guilt of individuals in this case. When I granted this private notice question, information about the matter going before the courts was not known, and that is why I made the statement that I did.

Mr. Robert Parry: Is the Secretary of State aware that I had a long meeting last Saturday with the full-time secretary and officials of the NGA at which strong allegations were made of police brutality against pickets? [HON. MEMBERS: "Shame."] Is he further aware that a number of pickets suffered head and leg injuries and concussion and that one of my constituents, Mr. Peter Stanton, whose height is less than 5 ft and who weighs less than eight stone, has a fractured shoulder bone? Will the right hon. Gentleman urge the Home Secretary to have words with the Cheshire police for a cooling down of tempers? The NGA members regret the injuries to a police officer in the early hours of this morning. Is he aware that if action is not taken to cool down the situation this will turn out to be the Grunwick of the north?

Mr. King: There is a proper procedure for charges or complaints of that kind and that certainly should be observed because nobody condones that sort of behaviour. The hon. Gentleman calls for a cooling down of the situation. I suggest that anything he can do to discourage such an assembly of pickets he should do; the assembly of, I understand, nearly 1,000 people outside the Warrington plant could hardly be a contribution to a cooling down of the situation.

Mr. Alistair Burt: Is my right hon. Friend aware that my constituents working on the Messenger newspaper voted on the closed shop issue some weeks ago, voted unanimously against and, as a consequence of that, now have pickets at their door? Does he agree that the National Graphical Association should call off its threat to my constituents' livelihood, look after the business of those who have chosen to represent them and leave my constituents alone?

Mr. King: I am aware of reports of the ballots that were taken and I understand that, according to those reports in both plants concerned there was a majority against membership of the NGA, the decision having been unanimous in one plant. That is part of the background to the dispute. My interest in the matter is to see that the dispute about recognition or the closed shop is resolved in a proper way, and neither I nor the Government are prepared to condone the sort of illegal and intimidatory picketing that has been taking place.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. In view of the point of order that was raised, I propose to take one more question.

Mr. Martin J. O'Neill: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that my union, the National Graphical Association, regrets that anyone should have been injured in the dispute but recognises that this morning the TUC came out in support of the NGA on the core of the issue—the victimisation of six former members of Mr. Shah's staff whom he has refused to reinstate? Is he further aware that it would be greatly appreciated by the trade union movement if he ensured that his officials acted as constructively as possible to secure conciliation because the only issue now at stake is that of the six members, and the union is looking to the right hon. Gentleman for support on that issue?

Mr. King: As I said in my statement, ACAS, which is independent, is seeking to achieve a settlement of the dispute. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will lend his good offices to ensuring that the NGA, in wishing to prosecute an industrial dispute—which it is entitled under the law of the land to do—will ensure that it conducts it within the law.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. A few days ago you were asked, as the result of a newspaper article, about the SDP and Liberals in particular not getting a fair crack of the whip in relation to speaking opportunities in the House. It may be remarkable to people outside Parliament—though it is not to most hon. Members—that when we get into the sharp end of politics, as we have just been doing—with the Tories supporting the bosses and the Labour party supporting the workers—SDP and Liberal hon. Members are not to be found.

Mr. Speaker: That is not a point of order for me.

Intermediate Nuclear Force Talks

The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Richard Luce): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I should like to make a statement about the INF negotiations.
As hon. Members may be aware, the Soviet delegate to the Geneva INF talks has made it clear this morning that the Soviet Union does not intend to continue the present round and has given no date for the resumption of the talks.
The Government regret this Soviet decision and can see no justification for it. As recently as 15 November the United States tabled a further constructive proposal in the negotiations, which was rejected out of hand by the Soviet Union. The Russians may seek to justify their interruption of the talks by the final preparations for initial Western INF deployment. But the House will recall that the West has remained at the conference table while the Soviet Union has increased its own deployments of SS20s by over 40 per cent.
The NATO Alliance has made its first priority the achievement of a balanced and verifiable agreement to reduce and if possible to eliminate these weapons worldwide. At the same time, we have made it clear that until such an agreement can be attained the Alliance will proceed in accordance with its decision in 1979 to work towards a balance which would safeguard Western security. We will not be deflected from achieving the first stage of this objective by the end of this year.
I wish to emphasise that the Alliance remains ready to halt or reverse at any time the deployment of the missiles if only we can secure an agreement with the Soviet Union that would allow us to do so. The achievement of such an agreement remains our unshakeable objective. The Alliance will spare no effort to secure it. We remain convinced that an agreement is possible and that it remains in the interests of East and West that the negotiations should resume at the earliest possible date. We therefore urge the Soviet Union to demonstrate an equally sincere commitment to arms control by returning to the negotiating table.

Mr. Denis Healey: Is the Minister aware that he has made a serious and disturbing statement, although the news was not unexpected? Does he recall that Her Majesty's Government have been arguing for four years that the moment the West began to deploy cruise and Pershing missiles agreement would be reached at the disarmament talks? Is it not clear that that could not have been more wrong? As the Soviet Union has frequently warned, it has produced a breakdown in the talks.
The Minister suggested that the responsibility for the breakdown lay exclusively with the Soviet Government. Is he aware that Her Majesty's Government's refusal to allow their Polaris force to be included in the balance has been a major obstacle to the talks until last week?

Mr. Churchill: Whose side is the right hon. Gentleman on?

Mr. Healey: I am on the side of peace and disarmament. Is the Minister aware that, only last week, the Soviet Government, at the last moment, offered not to include British and French nuclear forces in the balance and to reduce the number of their SS20s to half those


deployed in 1979 and their warheads to well under half those deployed in 1979? How can the hon. Gentleman justify the action of Western Governments in rejecting that offer out of hand and leaking the proposal? This is a repetition of their action over a similar proposal after the so-called "walk in the woods" a few months ago. Does the hon. Gentleman believe that this treatment of the serious proposals by the Soviet Government is consistent with the sincere negotiations on disarmament to which Western Governments committed themselves in December 1979?
Is the Minister aware that the decision to deploy cruise and Pershing missiles is opposed by a substantial majority of people in Britain and Germany—the two countries which are so far involved—and has done more damage to public support for the NATO Alliance than any other action during the past 34 years? Will the Government now insist that the United States Government should offer not to deploy any more missiles if the Soviet Union will agree to resume the talks? Will they also insist that the West should seek to take the latest Soviet offer as a starting point in renewed negotiations which, even at this late moment, might save us from an acceleration and escalation of a nuclear arms race which can only decrease the security of the British people and present a greater threat to the prospects for peace in the world?

Mr. Luce: The House will agree with the last remarks of the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) that it is our desire to see an end to an escalation of the arms race. I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman lays the responsibility for this latest development on the Western world and ignores essential facts. Since 1979 there has been a trebling of the number of SS20s. Since 1981 the numbers have increased by 40 per cent., and they are increasing at an average of one a week. The right hon. Gentleman seeks to ignore those salient facts that threaten our national security.
With his wealth of experience as Secretary of State for Defence, the right hon. Gentleman surely would agree that the prime duty of the Secretary of State for Defence and Her Majesty's Government is the security of the nation. That should be our first and ultimate objective.
I am surprised also at the right hon. Gentleman's comments about the United Kingdom and French strategic nuclear force. He knows that we are not talking about mixing like with like. The main point to come out of the discussions in public and at the INF level is that, whatever the Soviet Union's proposals, it wishes to retain a monopoly of intermediate range nuclear weapons. We believe that that poses a threat to our security, and we must consider that. Our genuine aim is to reach an agreement in Geneva, and we do not believe that we can do that by moving away from the negotiating table.

Mr. Healey: Is the Minister aware that the Soviet Government have had a monopoly of intermediate range missiles in Europe for over 20 years and that this was accepted by all previous British Governments—of both parties—since it was offset by the allocation of 400 Poseidon warheads to SACEUR? Is he aware also that the Soviet Government have offered to reduce the number of warheads deployed to half those that were deployed in 1979? Why did he not persuade the Americans to accept that offer as a basis for agreement? Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Labour party regard the deployment of what

has been described by the American negotiator, Mr. Perl, as a weapon of no obvious military utility—the cruise missile—is a means to increase Britain's insecurity rather than contribute to its support?

Mr. Luce: Against the background of the twin-track decision, the principle of which was supported by the Labour Government, I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman is suggesting that the Soviet Union should continue—whatever proposals it has put forward so far—with an overwhelming superiority and monopoly of those weapons? Does he believe that that is in the interests of Western security? I must ask the right hon. Gentleman that question, because it is a serious consideration in our national interests. The United States, with the full support of the NATO Alliance, has put forward proposals which, in broad terms, suggest a balance. We stand ready at any time to halt or reverse the deployment if the Soviet Union responds to our proposals.

Mr. Healey: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. It might be fairer to the House if the right hon. Gentleman were to speak again at the end of questions.

Mr. Julian Amery: Does my hon. Friend agree that, far from being scared by the Soviet walkout during the talks, most Europeans, especially in Britain and in Germany, will sleep more safely and securely in their beds now they know that the Soviet monopoly of these weapons is ending and some equilibrium is slowly on the way to being achieved?

Mr. Luce: It is essential that the Soviet Union—let alone our public—should understand that the resolution of the British and other Western Governments is to ensure the safety of our people. That is a prime objective. Allied to that, we have a genuine and earnest desire to seek an agreement that leads to a broad balance in weapons. We believe that that would be in the interests of all concerned. If the Soviet Union were ready to respond to those flexible proposals, we might make some progress.

Mr. David Steel: Does the Minister agree that the Soviet decision prematurely to end the talks should be universally deplored? Does he accept, however, that after four years the talks cannot be regarded as a great success, since they were billed as arms reduction talks but we have ended up with the deployment of cruise and Pershing in the West and a new generation of missiles in East Germany and Czechoslovakia? In the light of that, what is the Government's response to Prime Minister Trudeau's suggestion of a summit meeting of the five nuclear powers?

Mr. Luce: On the first point, I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman that the Soviet decision this morning is to be deplored. The Secretary-General of NATO, Dr. Luns, made exactly the same comments this morning in response to that decision. The Government remain ready to work as closely as possible with our allies, as we have done for a long time, to try to persuade the Soviet Union that it is in its own interests as well as ours that we should reach an agreement on balanced and verifiable arms reductions. That is our aim and any proposals, including those from Mr. Trudeau, must be seriously considered.

Sir John Biggs-Davison: Have the Government received an assurance that the United States


is ready to resume negotiations at the earliest possible moment and has not been discouraged by the somewhat childish tactics of Moscow?

Mr. Luce: President Reagan has already made it plain, not only that he joins us in regretting the Soviet decision this morning, but that the United States, with the full support of the rest of us, stands ready at any moment to resume discussions, and the sooner the better.

Dr. David Owen: Is the Minister aware that the central aim of all of us must be to restore the negotiations? In the meantime, is he aware that for very similar reasons, and with some of the same hesitations as Helmut Schmidt, I believe that NATO has no alternative but to continue with the first stage of the deployment? Will NATO Foreign Ministers now meet and consider seriously the possibility of declaring a freeze on first stage deployment of the 41 missiles when they become operational to allow time for the Soviet Union to reconsider its position and return to the negotiations, and will NATO maintain that freeze so long as there is any chance that the Soviet Union will negotiate a substantial reduction in the number of SS20s?

Mr. Luce: I am grateful for the right hon. Gentleman's first remarks. We now have no alternative but to proceed with deployment, but he is absolutely right to suggest that we should be ready at any moment to respond to any possibility of halting or reversing that if there is genuine progress in discussions. The sooner the discussions are resumed, the better.
As for consultation with other Foreign Ministers, the right hon. Gentleman will be aware that there is shortly to be a discussion at NATO level. All these matters can be assessed at that stage in the light of this morning's events. I am sure that there will be a renewed strong commitment to do whatever we can to try to get discussions going again.

Mr. Patrick Thompson: While we must all agree that the breakdown of the talks is most unfortunate and distressing, does my hon. Friend agree that responsibility for the Russian walk-out must be shared by all those people, including many Opposition Members, who have encouraged the so-called peace movements, which have increased the likelihood of a tactical walk-out of that kind?

Mr. Luce: My hon. Friend is right in the sense that, however sincere the people who have joined in the protest movements and however much we all share the desire for a lowering of tension, the Soviet Union has tried to use the protest movements to undermine the elected Governments of the Western world and the unity of the Western Alliance. Although the people concerned are extremely sincere in their intentions, the Soviet Union has tried to use them as a tactical ploy to its own advantage.

Mr. Donald Stewart: Is the Minister aware that many people in the West who have no illusions about the Soviet system cannot understand why the British and French nuclear capability is not included on the side of the West? Does he agree that in a two-sided confrontation no one would imagine that capability being used in support of the Warsaw pact and that that cannot be overlooked in negotiations?
As the CIA has announced that the Americans overestimated Russian missile deployment by 100 per

cent., what is the basis for suggesting that the Soviet Union has an overwhelming lead over the nuclear forces of the West?

Mr. Luce: I should first correct a point that I made to the right hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Dr. Owen). My reference to discussions at NATO level related to a meeting of Defence Ministers, not Foreign Ministers.
In answer to the right hon. Member for Western Isles (Mr. Stewart), we have discussed many times, including the recent debate on the twin-track policy, the position of the United Kingdom and French strategic deterrents. We have made it absolutely clear that we are talking about strategic weapons and not intermediate weapons, so we are not comparing like with like. My right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary has made it plain both at home and at the United Nations that if START makes progress and there is no strengthening of Soviet defences we could review our position and consider whether the United Kingdom and French strategic deterrents should be included in the discussions. At present, however, we are dealing with intermediate and not strategic weapons.

Mr. Stuart Bell: Does the Minister agree that the timing of the introduction of cruise and Pershing in Europe was a negotiating ploy to get the Russians to take the SS20s away from Eastern Europe? That ploy having failed, does he agree that there will now be more SS20s and other Russian nuclear missiles? Having failed to call the bluff of the Russian bear, will the Government now call President Reagan's bluff and return the cruise missiles already here to the United States?

Mr. Luce: We shall do no such thing in the absence of any agreement with the Soviet Union. I am surprised at some of the Opposition comments, which seem to ignore the facts of the case. They describe what the Western world, led by the United States, has been doing in the negotiations as a ploy, but it is clear from President Reagan's published proposals that there has been any amount of flexibility—zero option proposals or, in the absence of that ideal solution, an interim agreement at a lower level, and the latest proposal for a global figure of 420 warheads. So far, however, the Soviet Union has made it plain that it wishes to maintain a monopoly. That is the key point. It is the overall balance that we must aim for because that is how we believe that we can best achieve security.

Mr. Churchill: Is it not disturbing that, thus far, the Soviet Union has shown itself unwilling to enter into any agreement between East and West based on equality in numbers of warheads of this kind? Is it not appalling that the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) on behalf of the Labour party should put forward the case for a Soviet monopoly in these weapons? Bearing in mind that in the past four years the Soviet Union has added 200 SS20s with 600 warheads while we have remained at the negotiating table, what earthly justification is there for the Soviet Union to leave the talks when the first score of cruise and Pershing missiles arrive in Europe?

Mr. Luce: I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. Indeed, I go further. I hope that the situation is never reached, but even if we deploy the 572 cruise and Pershing 2 missiles over a five-year period there would still be a


Soviet monopoly, for which we would allow, in terms of the SS20s. There are more than 700 SS20 warheads now targeted on Western Europe.
In addition, the NATO Alliance has shown a genuine desire to make progress and to reduce tensions by the recent announcement that we shall reduce our arms by a further 2,000 shorter-range nuclear weapons in Western Europe. That is further evidence of the Western world's genuine desire to make progress in the negotiations. If the Soviet Union would only respond, there would at least be some hope.

Mr. Dick Douglas: Is not one of the most disturbing aspects of the Soviet withdrawal from the talks the view expressed by leading United States commentators that the Soviet Union will continue to be removed from the negotiating table until after the American elections? The Minister says that he will spare no effort. Will he apply his mind to linking the strategic arms negotiations with the INF talks because the nature, range and delivery capability of the weapons blur the two issues? Does he agree that we should therefore link the two and come to the negotiating table on all these issues before we blow one another up?

Mr. Luce: I remind the House, in answer to the hon. Gentleman, that the Soviet Union said this morning that it did not wish to continue the present round. Compared to previous rounds, this one has already gone on longer than any previous round. All that the Soviet Union has done is to say that it has not given a date for the resumption of talks on INF. I am not talking about START. The Soviet Union has given no indications on that matter. Obviously, we all hope that the talks will continue until they are due to adjourn, very shortly. All that I can say to the hon. Gentleman is that we can keep an open mind about the relationship between INF and START. At present they are divided between the two sets of talks, and we think that that is the best way to proceed.

Mr. George Walden: I accept the implication in the Minister's statement that there is no reason for alarm or despondency, or for a change in Western policy over deployment. However, will the Minister accept that the West should not merely return to the nuclear counting-house, but seek actively to create the political atmosphere for the eventual success of the negotiations, and that Britain should be more prominent in the search to promote that atmosphere?

Mr. Luce: I agree entirely with my hon. Friend that there should be no undue alarm. Indeed, the Soviet Union should understand the very genuine and strong desire of the Western world, including our Government, to achieve agreement as soon as possible, and to make progress in the Geneva discussions. Against that background, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs have said that we wish to have a dialogue with the Soviet Union. At least, we have to acknowledge that we live on the same planet, however much we may disagree with each other. We must find a way of living together. We shall certainly pursue that policy.

Mr. Bill Michie: Will the Minister state more clearly his answer to remarks by Conservative

Members about the peace movement helping to make the situation worse between East and West? Is the Minister saying that the peace movement, which includes ordinary people who want peace, the Roman Catholic Church, the Church of England, the Free Churches and the Quakers, has somehow connived to undermine the security of the Western world? Is the Minister saying that those people are naive, and do not understand all the problems that we are arguing about?

Mr. Luce: I do not believe that anybody is questioning the sincere desire of people in the protest movements for progress, and a reduction in arms. The point that I was making, in reply to an earlier question, is that the Soviet Union is and has been taking advantage of the protest movements to try to challenge the authority of elected Governments in the Western world, and to undermine the cohesion of the Western Alliance. That is not in our interests.

Mr. Michael McNair-Wilson: Does my hon. Friend agree that the walk-out proves that the Soviet Union's attachment to the INF talks lay in its hope, or belief, that it could reach an agreement with the West that left it with some supremacy in theatre nuclear weapons? If that is the case and, as the deployment of cruise and Pershing is going ahead in Western Europe, is there any real purpose in holding the talks again in their present form, or is it not time for both sides to take a breather and consider the situation anew?

Mr. Luce: We have been talking for just over two years, since the first Geneva talks started. It is fairly evident that the objective of the Soviet Government was to try to achieve an agreement that enabled them to have a strong monopoly of nuclear weapons. However, now that they see our resolution in starting to fulfil the principles of the twin-track policy, we must all earnestly hope that they understand that we are determined to defend ourselves and have a credible deterrent. At the same time, we are most anxious to reach an agreement with them. Against that background it is in all our interests—the Soviet Union's as well as Great Britain's—that they resume their position at the negotiating table.

Mr. Martin Flannery: Is it not a fact that, by deploying cruise missiles on our territory, the Government in no way represent the wishes of the majority of the British people and that the same is true of the Government in Western Germany? Has not the belligerent posture of the President of the United States over many areas of the world made mankind more fearful than ever before of those dreadful weapons and brought into the struggle against those weapons many people who were not in that struggle before? Has not the Prime Minister met real criticism in the meetings that she has had with the Heads of Government in India today? Does not all that mean that we should use our immense prestige and influence to bring back the Russians to the conference table so that the future can be discussed rationally, whether it be peace for all or Armageddon?

Mr. Luce: The British electorate had a chance in June this year to express their views on the Government's defence policy. They overwhelmingly endorsed it. Moreover, the German Bundestag, by a substantial majority, gave the go-ahead to the policy of deployment unless there were a negotiated settlement, and in Italy


there was a majority of 132 in favour of that policy. It is evident that the United States is demonstrating its commitment to the defence of the free and democratic way of life in Western Europe. The Soviet Union should be under no misunderstanding that the United States is committed to the defence of Western Europe and the Western world. If the Soviet Union has no misunderstanding about that, there is a better chance in the longer term of getting stronger security and peace.

Mr. Andrew MacKay: Is it not both extraordinary and sad that no Labour Member, not even the former Secretary of State for Defence the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey), has condemned Soviet withdrawal from the peace talks?

Mr. Luce: I agree with my hon. Friend. It is totally incomprehensible.

Mr. Ioan Evans: As we now have enough nuclear weapons on this planet to destroy it 10 times over, is it not a human tragedy that more resources will be devoted to building up a larger stock of nuclear weapons in the nuclear arms race? What positive initiatives will the Government take in view of the recent CIA report that the Russian build-up of arms had been greatly exaggerated? What positive response will the Government make if the Commonwealth should support the call by Premier Trudeau for a summit conference now not only of the United States and the Soviet Union, but of China, France and Britain, to get us out of this nuclear madness?

Mr. Luce: It is for the reason that the hon. Gentleman gave at the beginning of his question that we want a reduction in armaments. That makes it all the more regrettable that the Soviet Union took the decision that it did this morning. It is only by talking and negotiating in the conference chamber, not by declaratory measures or rhetoric, that we shall make any progress. That is why we regret and deplore the decision all the more. The NATO Alliance has undertaken a net reduction of 2,400 short range nuclear warheads. That, if anything, is a demonstration of our desire to make progress. That will lead to the lowest level of such warheads for 20 years.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: Does my hon. Friend agree that the Russians are probably watching reactions in democratic countries to their tactical and, I hope, temporary withdrawal from the talks? Would it not be right for the Russians to realise that every major political party in this country disapproves of their withdrawal from the talks? Would it not help if every major party made it clear that it did not want the Russians to have a monopoly of those types of weapons? Would it not be a helpful gesture to make sure that the Metropolitan police were deployed in large numbers round the Russian embassy today just in case the CND so disapproves of what the Russians are doing that it holds a demonstration there?

Mr. Luce: I think that the best contribution that the Leader of the Opposition and the Labour party could make to our security and the prospects for peace would be to stand up now and say that they believe we should stick together, that we believe in a balance of armaments, and that the best hope for the peace of the world is to fulfil the principle that successive Governments have accepted—a twin-track policy decision.

Mr. James Callaghan: Is it not to be remarked that the hon. Gentleman speaks of it being necessary for us to be at the negotiating table when he is reporting upon a series of talks in which we have played no part and have no power to influence what is taking place at the negotiating table? Is it not time therefore for us to consider very seriously the propositions that have half been put forward that this serious decision by the Soviet Union to withdraw provides an opportunity for a pause, for reflection, and perhaps for a new forum in which these matters can be discussed?
Should not the British and French weapons be included in one set of negotiations or the other so that if they are brought together they can be put on the table and be counted? I do not say that we should destroy our own weapons. That is not my position; I have never said that. Is there not a rational ground for the Soviet Union to say that these weapons, whether they crawl, swim or fly, are directed against them and therefore should be counted in the total?
Is not this a moment when we should not seek to condemn Moscow? I told them when I was there Clem Attlee's old dictum when it was suggested that the Labour party should walk out of the Chamber—"Don't walk out, you have only got to walk back some time". Is not that the position in which the Soviet Union will find itself?
Is it not the case that we cannot accept a Soviet veto in principle on the deployment of American nuclear weapons in Europe? Once that fact is accepted by the Soviet Union, is it not possible, as I believe firmly that it is, to reach an agreement since the issues that divide us are getting narrower the whole time? Therefore, although this breakdown is serious, does it not provide us with a fresh opportunity for beginning negotiations not in public, not making public offers, but in private in order to reach an agreement?

Mr. Luce: I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman that discussions in private in order to get agreement is the only sensible way to proceed and, with all his experience, he is in the best position to reflect on that. I wish that other Opposition Members would reflect his view that it is unacceptable to have a Soviet veto over the United States and Western policies in this field.
Earlier the right hon. Gentleman suggested that we do not have influence over the discussions in Geneva. We do. The NATO Alliance is consulting very closely and we fully support the flexible proposals that President Reagan has put forward.
In answer to the right hon. Gentleman's point about the need for time to reflect, as I said earlier, very shortly the Defence Ministers in NATO will be meeting and no doubt that will be a sensible occasion on which to reflect on the present position. But no one must be in any doubt about our sense of resolution in the Western world with regard to the twin-track policy.

Mr. Nigel Forman: Is it not abundantly clear from everything my hon. Friend has said this afternoon that Her Majesty's Government remain strongly committed to the cause of multilateral and genuine and balanced disarmament? However, is it not also important for the House to bear in mind that there is a danger of over-reacting to this Soviet walk-out that may have more to do with internal political difficulties in the


Kremlin than with a long-term strategic decision to boycott the negotiations? Will the Government therefore keep up the pressure in the way my hon. Friend suggested?

Mr. Luce: On the question of multilateral and balanced disarmament, I reaffirm that we are utterly committed to seeking ways in which we can achieve viable multilateral and balanced disarmament and we feel that this is the only safe way to proceed in arms control policies. Indeed, the House will have noted that some time ago Mr. Andropov himself intimated that he believed that this was the best way to proceed when he said that one-sided or unilateral disarmament was in itself naive.
I agree with my hon. Friend entirely that it would be wrong to over-react. We continue to invite the Soviet Union to return to the negotiating table, pointing out all the time that we believe that it is as much in their interest as it is in ours that the discussions should resume as soon as possible.

Mr. Roland Boyes: If the peace movement is helping the Soviet Union, how is it that the only party that is losing members faster than the British Communist party is the SDP?
Why has the Minister concentrated on only half the formula? He said that the talks had to lead to balanced and verifiable reductions. The big problem in the talks is that cruise missiles cannot be verified for a number of reasons. First, they are very small. Secondly, they are mobile. How can the Soviet Union count them their satellites—[Interruption.] An hon. Member refers to SS20s. They are launched from concrete pads—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member should not allow himself to be distracted. He must ask his question.

Mr. Boyes: I agree and I apologise, Mr. Speaker. I should not be distracted by buffoons.
Is it not a fact that these weapons are mobile, and if there is a dozen here today and a dozen there tomorrow the Russians will not know whether it is the same dozen? Is it a fact that cruise missiles can be hidden away? Is not the fact being overlooked that not 400 or 500 but 5,000, 6,000, 7,000 or perhaps 10,000 cruise missiles are being produced—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must bring his question to a close. He has had a very fair run. He may say his last words.

Mr. Boyes: My last word is that it is not just a question of 400 or 500 cruise missiles being produced but up to 10,000 can be hidden in submarines? How can they be verified? Will the Minister concentrate on the verification of cruise missiles apart from trying to achieve balanced reductions?

Mr. Luce: It is difficult to discover precisely the point of the hon. Gentleman's remarks. If he suggests that balanced reductions is the wrong way to proceed and that a Soviet monopoly is acceptable, I find that quite astonishing. Does he not realise that that in itself poses a threat to the security of our interests? As with every other kind of disarmament or arms control discussion, verification must be a salient part. It is essential that we should at least have the ability to ensure that agreements on both sides are being fulfilled. Surely he can see the point of that.

Several Hon. Members: rose —

Mr. Speaker: Order. This is a very important matter, but I must protect the business of the House. I shall allow these questions to continue until a quarter to five.

Mr. Ian Lloyd: Should not the House remind itself, especially in this difficult and dangerous context, of two fundamental differences between the Soviet Union and the West? The first is that no Soviet Minister, official or general—and we do not know who it should be—will today or tomorrow be answering at any dispatch box in public for his country's policy. The second is that the Soviet people would not have had the opportunity that the American people had last week to see the film "The Day After" which showed in the most dramatic and lurid form the consequences of a nuclear war. If the Russians are to return to the negotiating table in Geneva, would it not be a very good idea to challenge them to show that film in the Soviet Union?

Mr. Luce: The difference between ourselves and Moscow in terms of our way of life is stark. There would be no opportunity to discuss, as we are doing in this Chamber in a democratic fashion and with a variety of views, how we can best achieve peace and security. It is that democratic way of life that we are trying to preserve by our policies.
With regard to the film to which my hon. Friend referred and which I believe is to be shown in this country shortly, our policies are designed to avoid just that kind of catastrophe. It is with that in mind that we are pursuing our present policy on defence and disarmament.

Dr. John Marek: Will the Minister stop misrepresenting the position and trying to mislead the country by equating the cruise missile with the SS20? The cruise missile is a cheap, accurate, new generation weapon with a first strike capability—[HON. MEMBERS: "Rubbish".] I regret that the Soviet Union has walked out of the negotiations, but some Labour Members in the recent defence debate warned that that was likely, if only because of President Reagan's ludicrous proposals—which were meant for home public consumption rather than serious negotiations—and the problem of verification. The Minister should not be ingenuous about this. Otherwise we might believe him if he continues to adopt the attitude that this is not a serious problem for the Soviet Union. If he accepts these points, how long will it be before he realises that his policies will merely result in nuclear war in our lifetime?

Mr. Luce: I cannot understand why some Labour Members constantly ignore what has happened over the last few years. The SS20s pose a threat to Western Europe. We have a primary duty to defend ourselves. We merely wish to ensure that we have a credible deterrent policy. We are not talking about first strike. The NATO Alliance is concerned with the defence of the Western world. I and many others are disturbed and alarmed at the fact that people, such as the hon. Gentleman, seem to want to ignore the facts and evidence that confront us.

Mr. Nicholas Soames: The Russian walkout at Geneva should be deeply regretted. Nevertheless, should not Great Britain, with all its experience and expertise in world affairs, be involved in regular talks with


Russia on other matters so that a useful and valuable line of communication can remain open to deal with these local difficulties?

Mr. Luce: I agree with my hon. Friend. That is what the Prime Minister recently said. My hon. Friend the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Edinburgh, Pentlands (Mr. Rifkind), was in Moscow earlier this year. My right hon. and learned Friend has visited Hungary, and the Prime Minister will be doing so shortly. Our objective is to have a dialogue with the Soviet Union, and we invite it to respond.

Mr. Robert Litherland: Is the Minister aware that the NATO Commander-in-Chief is reported to have said that if he were losing a traditional battle on European soil he would use nuclear weapons, and that he had the political backing to do so? Will the Government give him that backing? Does not deployment of these weapons reflect the United States fallacy of a limited nuclear theatre war?

Mr. Luce: We are precisely in line with the policies pursued by previous Governments, including Labour Governments. Our first priority is the defence of our way of life. At all costs, if we possibly can, we wish to avoid conflict. That is what our policies are designed to achieve.

Mr. John Maples: One hopes that the breakdown in the talks will be temporary. However, has not every position adopted by the Soviet Union and every offer made by it, when unwrapped, effectively mean that it will continue to deploy several hundred SS20 warheads but that there will be no American deployment of cruise or Pershing 2s?

Mr. Luce: That is exactly the point, and it is essential that people should understand it. The Russians wish to maintain a monopoly. They wish to prevent the United States from deploying these weapons and showing their commitment to the defence of Western Europe.

Mr. Paddy Ashdown: As the Minister—and the Secretary of State in his statement on the arrival of cruise in Britain—placed great emphasis on the withdrawal of a significant number of nuclear weapons from Europe, may I draw to his attention the comments of Mr. Richard Wagner to the Military Constructions Appropriations Sub-Committee of the House of Representatives on 20 April, when he said:
Withdrawing weapons which are needed goes counter to everything we are trying to do to strengthen our posture in Europe. We do, however, frequently review our nuclear weapons posture and as we modernise the stockpile we do withdraw older unneeded warheads. For example, we have in the last year or so withdrawn 1,000 older weapons which we no longer need"?
Does the Minster agree that those weapons have been withdrawn not because they are a threat to the Russians, but because they are so old and out of date that they are probably a threat to our own troops? To represent that as a concession is damaging to our sincerity and negotiating posture. Does the Minister also recognise that far from imbalance—as agreed by a House of Representatives Congressional hearing recently—since START began 20 months ago, the United States has added—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman should watch the clock.

Mr. Ashdown: This is my last point, Mr. Speaker.
Since those talks began, the United States has added 900 warheads to its stockpile whereas the Soviet Union has added 600.

Mr. Luce: I continue to find it extraordinary that the hon. Gentleman does not find it possible to welcome the fact that the NATO Alliance has decided to reduce the number of warheads. The latest decision is to reduce this by another 2,000 short range nuclear weapons. That in itself must contribute to peace, and is a demonstration of our sincerity and desire to make progress. While we are reducing weapons, there is an increase in weapons on the other side. One additional SS20 a week has been deployed. We are now asking for a genuine response from the Soviet Union. We want that, await it and are ready to respond to it.

Mr. Healey: Do not these exchanges show that we all deplore the Soviet withdrawal from the talks? That is why I described it as serious and disturbing news, and suggested the steps that the West might take to secure a resumption of the talks. I regret that the Minister did not respond to that suggestion. If the talks can be resumed, the West is bound to take the view that President Reagan now takes—that equivalence in nuclear weapons does not require equality in every particular nuclear weapon. The Russians have a substantial superiority in intercontinental land-based missiles, but the Americans have a superiority of 5,000 to the Russians' 2,000 in submarine-launched warheads. Those are the figures in the Scowcroft report. A similar equivalence exists in Europe. All previous American and British Governments have accepted that the Soviet monopoly of land-based missiles was offset by the Western allocation of submarine-based missiles to SACEUR.
Is the Minister aware that the systematic leaking of the critical Soviet proposal—the one that arose from the so-called "walk in the woods" a few months ago—by the United States and the leaking by the German Government of the so-called "walk in the park" proposal damaged the credibility of Western Governments in the disarmament talks? It is essential that we should now resume the talks in private, accept that equivalence, not equality, is the objective, and take the first step to secure resumption by freezing further deployment of nuclear weapons on our side on condition that the Soviets resume talks. We should then seriously explore the Soviet offer to reduce their SS20s by half compared with the number they have deployed now, and the number of warheads by more than half compared with those deployed in 1979.

Mr. Luce: I welcome the fact that the right hon. Gentleman deplores the withdrawal. As he rightly said, we cannot make progress with the Soviet Union unless we have proper discussions round the negotiating table and in private. I agree that our first priority must be to persuade the Soviet Union to have these discussions in private.

Mr. Healey: On all sides.

Mr. Luce: I agree. That is the first priority. At the same time, I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman, with all his knowledge and experience, does not acknowledge that the Soviet Union is still insisting on an overwhelming monopoly of these weapons.
The right hon. Gentleman is right to suggest that we should seek a broad balance. It is essential that we have adequate deterrence. However, the right hon. Gentleman


has not acknowledged the essential fact that the Soviet Union insist on having an overwhelming monopoly. Until the Russians agree to talk about a balanced reduction of forces, it is difficult to envisage how we can make progress.

Emphysema (Compensation of Coal Miners)

Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide compensation for mineworkers under the Industrial Injuries Acts for emphysema.
Having discussed at some length the problem of the arms race and the millions of pounds that it will probably cost to blow us off the face of the earth, it is ironic that I, in my meak and mild way, should request the Government to provide a few measly pounds to protect and comfort the living.
Hon. Members will be aware that this is the third time that I have brought this matter to the attention of the House. I presented a Bill in October 1982 and a further Bill in March 1983. I make no apology for my persistence. I consider that those who suffer from emphysema and have become incapacitated, because they are or were coal miners, should be recognised as suffering from an industrial injury.
Miners suffer from many industrial diseases—for example, pneumoconiosis and silicosis—which are recognised as being industrial illnesses. However, some are not. Unfortunately, emphysema falls into the latter category. The reason is that there is insufficient evidence to show that it is an occupational rather than a generalised disease. Recent research has shown that emphysema should no longer be classified in this way. It must be put alongside industrial diseases in the primary class, and thereby enable sufferers to receive compensation. As a result of the overwhelming research carried out in this sphere, it is unlikely that subsequent research will reveal anything new. In October 1982 I presented a detailed list of research. I do not intend to cite that detail again. I assure the House that it was scholarly and decisive.
Yesterday morning I received a letter from a constituent who is a consultant in respiratory diseases. He referred to the case of a non-smoking miner who was refused compensation by a pneumoconiosis panel. The same panel deals with cases of emphysema. He considered that the panel's reasoning for refusing compensation was poor. The letter states:
Whilst I would accept the assessment of the pneumoconiosis panel that this man only qualifies for 10 per cent. compensation with regard to pneumoconiosis, I think that his respiratory disability is almost entirely related to his work in the colliery, and as such that it severely limits his exercisability.
I would strongly support his claim to receive further compensation on the basis of an obstructive airways disease related to the pneumoconiosis.
I challenge the authority of the pneumoconiosis panels. Rumour has it that many such panels consist of retired medical practitioners who need ready cash. I wonder how many members of the panels in Sheffield or in other parts of the country have specific qualifications in respiratory research or have attended courses on this subject in the past five years?
An editorial in The Lancet in March, which relied on a body of recent research, stated that emphysema in coal workers was an occupational illness and that sufferers should receive compensation. All hon. Members are aware that The Lancet has great authority. Eight months have


passed since the article was published, yet no champion has come forward in its columns to challenge that opinion. We should heed what the article says.
Armed with that information, I approached the then Minister for Social Security. I asked if he would list the research used by the industrial injuries advisory council as I wished to compare it with my research. He said that to review all the evidence used by the council would be impracticable.
Miners are practical men and mining is a practical occupation. Emphysema is a physical condition of practical miners. It behoves me, as an ex-miner, to ask whether any practical clerk can produce such a list. The reason why such a list cannot be produced is that it is undesirable, rather than impracticable, to show that the civil servants have not seriously reviewed the new research.
At the beginning of 1982, I presented two Bills which rested on research conducted in the 1980s. The House requires an answer to the question: why are coal miners 10 times more at risk from emphysema than the rest of the general public? The total compensation award for sick miners would in the first year cost about £2·25 million. Such a sum is coppers compared with the amounts involved in producing nuclear warheads.
On 22 March I told the House that academic research had established that coal miners are 10 times more at risk from emphysema than other members of the general public. That fact has still to be challenged. I challenge any member of the medical profession to refute my statement, but only after in-depth research. I challenge the Government to institute in-depth medical research and to provide evidence to the industrial injuries advisory council. If the Government are not prepared to acknowldge my evidence, they should set up an investigation to show that The Lancet editorial is fallacious.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse, Mr. Roy Mason, Mr. Alec Woodall, Mr. Peter Hardy, Mr. J. D. Concannon, Mr. Allen McKay, Mr. William O'Brien, Mr. Martin Redmond, Mr. Terry Patchett, Mr. Walter Harrison, Mr. Kevin Barron and Mr. Alexander Eadie.

EMPHYSEMA (COMPENSATION OF COAL MINERS)

Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse accordingly presented a Bill to provide compensation for mineworkers under the Industrial Injuries Acts for emphysema: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 9 December and to be printed. [Bill 60.]

Opposition Day

4th Allotted Day

Pensioners

Mr. Michael Meacher: I beg to move,
That this House regrets that this week's pension uprating is below the current rate of inflation, leading to a significant loss in purchasing power for over nine million pensioners; and calls upon Her Majesty's Government to reverse its damaging and increasingly discredited economic policies which are depriving pensioners of the higher living standards they deserve.
It is often said that it is by its treatment of its elderly people that a society should be judged. I agree with that, and we approach this debate in that constructive spirit. The Opposition chose this issue partly because we want to draw the nation's attention to the re-emergence of mass poverty in our society. Today, more than 7 million people are wholly dependent on means-tested supplementary benefit for their survival. That is 60 per cent. more than four years ago, and a great many of those people are pensioners. Altogether roughly two out of every three pensioners are living in poverty, or on its margins.
One of the prime signs of the poverty that millions of pensioners face is that they are increasingly forced to choose between food and heating. I shall cite just one example that I found in the newspaper. It is not in any way exceptional. Indeed, I fear that it is wholly typical. The article states:
Mr. Frederick Moody, an 82-year-old pensioner, survives in his bed sitter by keeping an electric heater half switched on for just eight hours a day. He gets up at 10 am and is in bed by 6 pm. Even with extreme economy he has watched his autumn bills jump from £17 to £23 in the last two years since the Government let fuel bills rise.
Mr. Moody is being forced to try to solve the problem by staying in bed for 16 hours a day. Life is being increasingly reduced to that standard for millions of pensioners under this Government's regime.
What are the Government doing to help the millions like Mr. Moody? Two days ago the pension was increased by 3·7 per cent., an amount significantly below the inflation rate, which is now running at 5 per cent. or more. That means that the living standards of married pensioners will be cut now, and over the whole of the rest of the year by about £1 per week. In effect, married pensioners are being robbed of the equivalent of one week's pension in a full year. To most pensioners that is a significant sum.
I am sure that the Secretary of State will say that the shortfall will be made good at the time of the next uprating. He always says that, and no doubt he w ill say it again today. However that does not solve the main problem. Unlike the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues, most pensioners do not have a pool of reserve capital on which to fall back in hard time. For pensioners, a cut is a cut. The increase, which is well below the rate of inflation, means a significant and big cut in the living standards of millions of pensioners. The Secretary of State may say that pensioners are protected because last year they received an increase above the going rate of inflation. He may say that they can use that excess to tide them over this year. However, if that is the argument, it confirms what the Opposition have always suspected—that the


Chancellor of the Exchequer's change in March in the method of uprating was simply a backdoor manoeuvre to claw back the excess that he dared not take openly. The Government, then, have simply devised a system of getting their clawback without having to admit it openly.
Thus, whether we think of the meanness of the clawback or the enforcement of lower living standards, the fact remains that pensioners will be getting a bum deal this winter.

Mr. Andrew Bowden: I apologise for intervening so early in the hon. Gentleman's speech, and congratulate him on his new appointment. He will know of my interest in pensioners. I understood the hon. Gentleman to say that Mr. Moody would be faced with a quarterly autumn bill of something in excess of £23 or £24. Mr. Moody is 82 and is, therefore, almost certainly entitled to the highest level of heating supplementary benefit. How much would he get in one quarter at the new high rate of heating supplementary benefit?

Mr. Meacher: That is an interesting question. I do not know the answer, because I do not know the circumstances of the case. However, it is quite likely that Mr. Moody is one of the 2 million pensioners who do not get supplementary benefit and who are simply on rate and rent rebates. There are another 900,000 pensioners who are entitled to supplementary benefit; but who do not receive it. That means that there are nearly 3 million pensioners who will not receive the heating additions, because the additions are limited purely to those on supplementary benefit. I do not know whether Mr. Moody is one of them. However, more than half of all pensioners do not receive such aid, and it is quite likely that he is one of them. It would be more helpful if the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Mr. Bowden) told the Government that they should provide those 2 million pensioners with heating additions.

Mr. Ralph Howell: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if Mr. Moody is not receiving that supplement he must have other means that exclude him from supplementary benefit?

Mr. Meacher: The hon. Gentleman comes from a class that certainly does have other means. He should not assume that other people are necessarily like him. However, the newspaper article further states that Mr. Moody
fits into the national picture of pensioners—he pays his bills on time, tries to keep down his total bill below £2 a week and is not sure whether he should be entitled to charity.
Mr. Moody is certainly one of those who does not want to have to claim. He wants benefits as of right, and so do we. That is how pensioners should be assisted.
I have described the situation facing 9 million elderly people. However, something much more fundamental is at stake. It is not a question of whether the Government have maintained the pension in line with inflation. That is what the Secretary of State keeps coming back to. The question is whether pensioners have shared in rising living standards. That is the essential issue and it is a central part of our case, because under this Government they patently have not done so. In case the Secretary of State thinks that I have chosen the criterion for my own purposes, I should

point out that the Opposition did not choose it themselves. It was originally accepted by the Government. In 1979, the former Secretary of State said:
My right hon. Friends and I have repeatedly committed ourselves to ensure that pensioners share in rising prosperity."—[Official Report, 20 December 1979; Vol. 976, c. 903.]
That is what was said four years ago, but it clearly has not happened. Since that statement was made, the record on every count belies it. Ever since then, the Government have consistently used clawback in one form or another precisely to prevent that from happening. In November 1980, the uprating was delayed for two weeks, which cost the pensioner couple £12.30. That loss was never made up. In November 1981, the Government clawed back 1 per cent. so that pensioners would not be permitted even to keep a meagre 25p a week. In November 1982 the pension uprating again turned out to overrun estimated inflation, and again the Government threatened to use clawback to obtain the extra sum. A more deliberate, calculated and persistent policy of nailing pensioners down to the floor of inflation could scarcely be devised.
The Government's promises to pensioners are not worth the paper that they are written on. Rather than honouring their word and trying to meet the targets which they rightly announced when they first came to power, the Government cynically changed those targets on the principle that if it is not possible to score a goal shift the goalposts. That is what the Government did. They dropped higher living standards as an objective for pensioners. They then proclaimed that price-matching was the height of their ambition and, having achieved that, claimed to have scored a major victory. Big deal. As the British Pensioners Action Association said recently, on being told that pensioners had been awarded an extra 5p under the so-called Rossi price index, "Do not spend it all at once".
I accept that, like the Labour party, the Tories are sincere when they say that they would like pensioners to enjoy higher living standards. The difference between us is that the Labour party did something. In five years of Labour Government the pension increased by 20 per cent. in real terms. In nearly five years of the Conservative Government the pension has increased by only 3 per cent. in real terms and that includes this week's uprating. Even that tiny margin of improvement will almost certainly be eroded by inflation in the next 12 months. That is the measure of the difference in performance between the two parties.
The truth is that pensions are no more safe in the Prime Minister's hands than is the National Health Service. Pensions are not safe in the Prime Minister's hands because she cannot resist tampering with them. Her most serious act of interference was committed in 1980 when she broke the link that Labour made between pensions and the rise in prices or earnings, whichever was the greater. At a stroke, pensions were decimated and have remained so ever since.
If Labour's method of uprating had been preserved, the single person's pension would now be £2.95 higher and the pension for a married couple would be £4.65 higher. Those are large sums of money for most pensioners. As a result of the Government's shabby manoeuvre, since 1980 pensioners have been robbed of about £2 billion. That is the extent of the Tory Government's meanness towards elderly people.

Mr. Peter Lloyd: With regard to the Labour Government's method of uprating—by prices or


earnings, whichever was the higher—will the hon. Gentleman confirm that that is what the Labour Government did each year that they were in office? I have a strong impression that they broke their promise.

Mr. Meacher: The hon. Gentleman is not on to a good point.

Mr. Lloyd: I am.

Mr. Meacher: What matters to pensioners is the result, not the procedure or the method. They are worried about cash in the pocket and how much it increases their prosperity. The fact remains that, at the end of five years under Labour, pensioners were 20 per cent. better off in real terms as compared to 1974. Under the Tory Government, they are a mere 3 per cent. better off. At the end of next year they will be 0 per cent. better off.

Mr. Robert McCrindle: Since the intervention made by my hon. Friend the Member for Fareham (Mr. Lloyd), the hon. Gentleman has made considerable play of how much better pensioners did under the Labour Government. Has he calculated how much better still they would have done if the Labour Government had not failed to reach their policy target in four of the nine years in which it was in operation?

Mr. Meacher: I am glad to harness the hon. Gentleman to the Labour Government's objectives. As he is so anxious that pensioners should be rewarded as richly as he would appear to believe, I am sure that he will support the Opposition, as that is the best way in which to achieve the objectives that he mentioned.
The Opposition are aware that big increases in the real value of pensions, such as Labour achieved, must be paid for.

Mrs. Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Meacher: In a moment.
The Government sometimes argue—no doubt the Secretary of State will do so again today—that however much the Government might like to make substantial increases in pensions, the necessary resources are simply not available. I must tell the Secretary of State that such preening of the conscience would be far more credible if such resources as the Government command were used to reduce poverty and not to enhance wealth. Nye Bevan said that Socialism is the language of priorities. It is. However, the language of priorities also gives meaning to capitalism. The Government's priorities are all too plain. In 1980 they chopped £500 million by uprating pensions and other long-term benefits in line with prices only. They chopped £100 million by deferring the 1980 uprating for two weeks. They chopped another £500 million by abolishing the earnings-related supplement and by other changes in the Social Security Act 1980.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: rose—

Mr. Meacher: They chopped another £200 million through the 1 per cent. clawback in November 1981. In every case—

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: Will the hon. Gentleman give way before he leaves chopping?

Mr. Meacher: I shall chop the hon. Lady out of any right to speak if she continues to break in.

Mr. Kellett-Bowman: The hon. Gentleman is afraid.

Mr. Meacher: In each case, the Government reduced aid to pensioners and other people who are among the poorest people in Britain. The total cut amounted to £1 ·3 billion. How was the money that was clawed back from pensioners and the poor used? It is perhaps no coincidence that that sum was almost exactly the same as the value of the tax handouts that were given away to the rich in the 1979 and 1983 Budgets. In other words, £1·4 billion was given away in reductions in the higher tax rates and rises in the higher tax thresholds.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: Will the hon. Gentleman give way now?

Mr. Meacher: No.
Bearing in mind Government accounting conventions, I am the first to admit that there was not a straight swap from one to the other, but that was unquestionably the effect. Under the Government the poor have got poorer and the rich have got richer. There can be no doubt about that and it has happened on a big scale.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that many of my constituents have managed to put away a certain amount of their income for a rainy day or for their retirement? They have done that throughout their working life although they were not well paid as it is not a well-paid area. Will the hon. Gentleman express the regret that he should feel that the Government whom he supported chopped their savings in half?

Mr. Meacher: I am glad that the hon. Lady is getting so worked up about private pensioners with modest private pensions.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: I am talking not about them but about elderly people who have put money away out of an honest income.

Mr. Meacher: I am also talking about elderly people who saved up modest pensions.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: Not pensions but small lump sums.

Mr. Meacher: Perhaps the hon. Lady is as worried as the Opposition that the Government decided in Cabinet—apparently they did not understand what they were doing but perhaps that is the normal way in which they make decisions—to make major cuts in the private pensions of occupational pensioners.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: So the hon. Gentleman does not like that?

Mr. Meacher: I am desperately opposed to that cut. If the hon. Lady were a little more genuine and a little less partisan she would join us in condemning the Government for what they have just done.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: My hon. Friend should be aware that, when he is dealing with the hon. Lady, she is likely to be envious of the fact that he is advancing an argument for increasing pensions because she has just suffered the bad result, so I am told, of having her European seat taken away from her. She is therefore losing more than half of the expenses that she has been picking up.

Mr. Meacher: My hon. Friend has the knack of putting his finger on a matter.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: On a point of order, I14r. Deputy Speaker. May I refer you to the remarks made by


the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner). I have clearly stated my intentions throughout my term, but the hon. Gentleman has complained that I should not be in Europe—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harold Walker): Order.

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: rose—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Lady knows that that is not a point of order.

Mr. Meacher: The hon. Lady has managed to combine a misunderstood intervention with a bogus point of order. I suggest that she stays in Brussels.
It does not wash when Ministers, such as the Secretary of State, loudly proclaim their integrity, as the right hon. Gentleman has done many times over the past few months. They say that although this has been the worst slump—we agree with that—since the 1930s, nevertheless they have done the decent thing and stuck by the pensioner, but there is not any more money available. The fact is that the record gives the lie to every word of the Government.
I hope the Secretary of State will pay attention to me as I examine what has happened under this Government, on the one hand to the pensioner and on the other to a director paid at the Secretary of State's level. In 1979, the pensioner got an extra £3·80 a week in the uprating. A director got an extra £74 a week from the Budget. These are not my figures but the Government's figures from Hansard of 21 November 1979, column 227. That £74 a week would be a fortune for pensioners, but that is the priority of the Government in our society-0 for the pensioners and £74 for the directors. This was not a one-off exercise in the first year—the exuberance of the new Government. In 1980, the pensioner got £3·85 and the director an extra £9·33 a week from the Budget. Again, these are the Government's figures from Hansard 23 April 1980, column 146. In 1982, the pensioner got an extra £3·25, and the director and extra £10·67 a week from the Budget. These are again the Government figures in Hansard of 20 April 1982, column 60 It was not that the money was not available, but that under capitalism—and Thatcherism is a reversion to unreconstructed capitalism—pensioners do not count high in the priorities. That is what this is about.
It is not only the present pension provision, but the future pension entitlement that is under threat from the Government. The best deal that pensioners ever had was provided by Labour's 1975 earnings-related pension scheme, and I pay a warm tribute to my former colleague, Brian O'Malley, for that. When the scheme is fully mature in 1998, a married man on average earnings will receive a pension of over half his gross earnings, and a single person on similar earnings will receive a pension of around 40 per cent. That is a huge step forward. However, such is the Government's lust for cuts that this excellent scheme is subject of an unspecified threat.
In his New Society article a month ago the Secretary of State said:
We will be announcing a major inquiry into pensions soon.
We all know what Government inquiries into health and social security matters are about, and I understand that his officials were none too pleased about the right hon.

Gentleman's disclosure, so no doubt there is trouble brewing. The interviewer asked the Secretary of State a straight question, which was:
Can you give an assurance that the earnings-related scheme will be preserved in its present form?
The Secretary of State gave a characteristically evasive answer and said:
The aim is to try to come to an objective view of what the cost of it is going to be and to look at the other side—what standard of living people in retirement should be entitled to.
I have news for the Secretary of State. People are entitled to receive what they have contracted and paid for, and nothing less. The truth is that this scheme is a solemn contract between the generations. Will the right hon. Gentleman give an unequivocal and public commitment that he will not interfere with it? In particular, because this rumour is rife, as the Secretary of State must know, will he explicitly deny the rumours that the Government are contemplating cuts such as discontinuing the right of a widow to go on receiving the pension on the basis of her husband's contributions? Surely, there are some things that are sacred even for this Government. I hope that the Secretary of State will give that answer.
The reality is, as my hon. Friends seem to believe, that wherever the Government's eye turns on matters affecting pensioners, nothing is safe from them, whether the threat is cuts in services, removal of concessions, higher charges on essentials, or simply inactivity where reform is needed or was promised.
Let us take the pension earnings rule. In 1979, the Tory manifesto pledged the Tory party to phasing out the earnings rule in the lifetime of Parliament, but nothing was done. The pledge was repeated in the 1983 Tory manifesto and so far nothing has been done again. Even this latest increase this week has still not returned the value of the pensioners' earning rule to the real level at which it was held in May 1979 when the Labour Government left office.

Mr. Sydney Bidwell: What has not emerged is that there are many pensioners, particularly the older and more dignified ones, who simply will not go for supplementary benefit even though the value of their state pension has been eroded. This is the reality. They will live in the same conditions as in the case cited by my hon. Friend at the beginning of his speech. Those are the facts, and the pensioners are not fools. Those who live close to them, and Labour Members in particular have these cases coming to them all the time, are not fooled either. The Government will reap the whirlwind in consequence of the pensioners' movement against the Government.

Mr. Meacher: That is an important point. There are about 1 million pensioners who, for their own good reasons that we all understand, and for the sake of their self-respect, are unwilling to accept what they see as help. They will accept benefits only as a right. It is for that reason that we are so concerned that the pension has simply been kept up in line with prices and not with earnings. Had it been kept in line with earnings, even those 1 million would have had a steadily increasing income. My hon. Friend is making a point about which we should all be concerned.
Let us also take the example of the death grant, which is deeply symbolic of the yearning for dignity of millions of elderly people. In March 1982, the Government issued a consultative document on the subject, which represented


a typically mean response to the problem. No new resources would be committed to the grant. Instead, they proposed the restructuring of the existing expenditure on a means-tested basis. I warn the Secretary of State that this is totally unacceptable. The right hon. Gentleman might as well withdraw that consultative document. The Labour party will increase the grant and keep it as a benefit as of right, and it will take action to control funeral prices, which have soared during the past few years. I am convinced that that is the right solution.
Hon. Members on both sides of the House will recognise that mobility is a crucial part of the health and well-being of pensioners. In London, 1 million pensioners have claimed bus passes, yet Age Concern was so troubled by the Government's White Paper on public transport that it was moved to say, with good reason, that the future of free public transport for the elderly in London is now at serious risk.

Mr. Charles Kennedy: The hon. Gentleman will recognise that the alliance has given considerable support to the points that he makes against the Government, but I should be interested to hear how the Labour party, were it returned to office, would finance those proposals. During the election campaign in the summer the shadow Chancellor, who would presumably have been Chancellor in a Labour Government, disowned most of the economic policies on which the Labour party fought the general election.

Mr. Meacher: One could ask a similar question of the SDP, but since that party will never be elected to office it does not matter. It is little use to make promises. What really matters is the record, which shows that the Labour Government made available to pensioners, in the state pension and in other ways, much more money than has been given to them before or since then.

The Secretary of State for Social Services (Mr. Norman Fowler): The hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy) has made a fair point. Is the Labour party pledged to the precise promises that it made about pensions and related spending during the election campaign?

Mr. Meacher: The right hon. Gentleman must await our statement of policy, which I hope will be produced soon. However, I assure him that the Labour party will devote considerably greater resources to pensioners than he has managed to do.
It is widely accepted on both sides of the House that heating costs for the elderly have become a scandal. There is good reason to believe that the number of pensioners who die from hypothermia is much greater than we see in the official records. However, leaving aside the headlines about hypothermia deaths, surveys have shown that more than one quarter of the elderly—or 2·5 million people—will have living room temperatures this winter below the level at which employers would be liable to prosecution under the Offices, Shops and Railway Premises Act 1963. Fuel prices are critical for old people, since the proportion of their budget that is devoted to heating is almost double that of other households. Pensioners have been nothing less than devastated by rocketing fuel prices during the past three or four years. During that period pensions increased by 68 per cent., but electricity prices increased by 84 per cent. and gas prices by no less than 116 per cent.

The Government are condemning millions of pensioners to a life in the cold. That is why, under this Government, more and more pensioners are forced to make the fundamental choice between eating and heating. It is a national disgrace.

Mr. McCrindle: The hon. Gentleman has expressed indignation about heating costs. Can he explain why, in constant 1982–83 prices, the total amount of expenditure on heating costs under the Labour Government in 1978–79 was £201 million, whereas under the Conservative Government in 1982–83 it had increased to £325 million?

Mr. Meacher: The hon. Gentleman forgets to take into account the fact that there are many more pensioners today than there were in 1979. If he works out the sum on a per capita basis, I suspect that there will be little difference in the figures.
The housing benefits scheme—which is a polite euphemism for an administrative mess—has been a disaster. More than 1 million pensioners have lost benefit, and one sixth of them have lost more than 75p a week, which is no mean sum for a pensioner. Far from simplifying matters, this scheme has spawned a system that is difficult and expensive to administer, and incomprehensible to most of those whom it is supposed to help. The hon. Member for Lancaster (Mrs. Kellett-Bowman) failed to recognise that the Chancellor has made matters worse because of the cuts in housing benefit that he announced in his autumn statement last Thursday. They will especially hit elderly people with a modest occupational pension, who may suffer cuts of up to £5 a week. There must be something radically wrong with a scheme that leads to old-age pensioners who have not owed a penny in rent in their lives suddenly being in rent arrears of £400.
I quote only one example of the chaos and anxiety that the scheme has produced:
Until last November the Shaws paid their £18 a week rent from their pensions, which was topped-up with a payment from the DHSS. Then they got a letter telling them to stop paying rent. They did as they were told and their pension was cut by £13 a week as the rent was now paid direct to the council. At the beginning of February the Shaws got a letter from Birmingham Council, threatening them with eviction because they were behind with their rent. Horace, an 80-year-old retired railway guard who has never been in debt in his life could not understand it, so he telephoned the council. Nothing happened until May, when the Shaws saw their local councilor. The housing department said everything had been sorted out, but the next month the Shaws got another letter telling them that they were £365 in arrears. And later in the month the council told them to pay these off at £2 a week.
That is pretty rich for those who simply did what they were told.

Mrs. Jill Knight: Will the hon. Gentleman accept that the Members of Parliament for Birmingham have taken up some of the cases to which he quite fairly referred? There has been much worry, but it was caused by difficulties at the beginning of the scheme, which have now been sorted out. Does he agree that it is infinitely better that the rent should be paid direct either to the local council or to the private landlord, because before this scheme rents were often not paid?

Mr. Meacher: The hon. Lady is wrong to say that the matter is almost settled. Tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of pensioners are still suffering from chronic


anxiety. Rent arrears in the Anchor Association have soared to unprecedented levels and are only gradually decreasing.
I am glad that the Minister for Health is in the Chamber, because I wish to deal with the cuts in health and personal social services. Elderly people, more than anyone else, will bear the brunt of the health cuts, and for them the consequences will not only be those set out in our motion—lower living standards. There will also be the loss of the care on which they depend and which they desperately need, and unquestionably for some it will mean premature death. Last Friday I visited Thornton Heath hospital in Bradford, of which the Minister will be aware, where 70 frail elderly patients are looked after lovingly by staff whose devotion to them led them to occupy the hospital. Now it is threatened with closure by the so-called Lawson cuts. It is the only home that those elderly and helpless patients know. If the Government cuts force its closure, and that of many similar hospitals, it will almost certainly mean that half of the patients will die within about three months. That is what happened when the Government forced the closure of St. Benedict's hospital, and the story is being repeated all over Britain. The elderly are suffering, and the consequences are tragic.
Is that what we have come to in Britain? Do not the pensioners, who have served Britain with their labour for all their lives, deserve better from us? Are not the indignities and deprivations that I mentioned, and the multiple hardships that are being heaped on millions of pensioners, an indictment of the nation and of this Government, who have made it all too clear that their priority is to stuff the pockets of the rich with gold, even if it means that the elderly and the poor go without food and suffer the cold?
We believe in a better society, a society where pensioners share in rising living standards, where expanding health and personal social services provide a base for security and dignity in old age, and where the needs of the elderly are not sacrificed to the interests of those who have wealth and power. It is because we not only believe in that but have shown in the past how on each count rhetoric can be matched by action that I call on all my right hon. and hon. Friends and all other hon. Members who share our ideals to vote for our motion tonight.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: I inform the House that Mr. Speaker has selected the amendment standing in the name of the Prime Minister.

The Secretary of State for Social Services (Mr. Norman Fowler): I beg to move, to leave out from "House" to the end of the Question and to add instead thereof:
congratulates Her Majesty's Government for successive increases in retirement pensions which have increased the purchasing power of nine million pensioners since 1978–79; recognises the success of this Government's economic policies in reducing and controlling inflation; and notes that the greatest single threat to the security, savings, and living standards of pensioners would be the reversal of these policies.
I again welcome the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) to his new job and to his first debate in that capacity. He comes to these debates with a record of his

own, because he was a junior Minister at the Department of Health and Social Security in the Labour Government between June 1975 and April 1976. That period was significant for pensioners in a number of ways which it appears have temporarily escaped the hon. Gentleman's memory.
First, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Mrs. Knight) was right in what she said. The hon. Gentleman did not say much about the rate of inflation during his time at the Department of Health and Social Security. During that period, inflation was destroying pensioners' savings at a record rate. It was the highest inflation rate for generations. During his period at the DHSS it reached 26·9 per cent. So the hon. Gentleman is uniquely qualified to talk about the effects of inflation on the pensioner.
Secondly, there was the matter of the Christmas bonus. The hon. Gentleman did not mention that, although he mentioned virtually everything else. Opposition Members now say a great deal about increasing that bonus, but it should be remembered that in 1975 and 1976 the Labour Government did not pay a Christmas bonus at all.
Thirdly, and most significant—this is particularly important, bearing in mind the hon. Gentleman's remarks about cynically changing the system—he did not say that during his time as a Minister at the DHSS Ministers decided to change the uprating basis. They decided to switch from the historic to the forecast method. That meant one thing, and one thing alone: they did not pay pensioners for the period when inflation was at its highest. As a result, the Labour Government, who should have paid 21 per cent. on the historic method, paid 15 per cent., thereby saving themselves £500 million. At today's prices that is more than £1 billion. Therefore, we shall not take lectures from the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Meacher: No doubt the Secretary of State has had Conservative Central Office, as well as his Department, working flat out to find criticisms, so I hope he will accept that what he has said is remarkably feeble. Bearing in mind the three criticisms that he has made, will he confirm that pensions rose by 20 per cent. over and above inflation during the Labour Government's five years in office and that under his Administration and that of his predecessors pensions rose by 3 per cent.?

Mr. Fowler: If the hon. Gentleman regards the three criticisms that I made of his record as feeble, I should tell him that there are many other criticisms that we shall make of it. It would be a mistake for the House to believe that in his period at the DHSS he was seen as the unquestioned hero of the pensioners. I quote from The Times of 11 March 1976, which, for the hon. Gentleman, had the rather unpromising headline:
Minister shouted down at pensions rally.
The report says:
old age pensioners shouted down Mr. Meacher, Under Secretary of State at the Department of Health and Social Security, yesterday as he tried to explain the Government's record on pensions.
Before the hon. Gentleman claims that it was a meeting of retired Conservative agents, I should point out that it was a rally of 2,000 pensioners from all over the country, and it was organised by a trade union action committee. The hon. Gentleman has a great deal to be modest about on his own record, and we on the Conservative Benches do not feel inclined to take lectures from him.

Mr. George Foulkes: Before the Secretary of State leaves the three points of criticism, one of which was the Christmas bonus, will he be announcing an increase in the Christmas bonus? Is he aware that to maintain it at the level at which it was introduced it should now be £38? Will he accept the early-day motion that was signed by many of his colleagues, including the hon. Member for Watford (Mr. Garel-Jones), who has conveniently disappeared? Ah, there he is! Will the Secretary of State announce an increase in the Christmas bonus today, because this is the perfect opportunity?

Mr. Fowler: The hon. Gentleman's eyesight is about as bad as his points. My answer is that we have no intention of abolishing it this Christmas, which is what the hon. Member for Oldham, West did.

Mr. Simon Hughes: Before the Secretary of State leaves the subject of meeting pensioners, is he prepared to say that he will leave the doors of his office and come and meet the hundreds of pensioners in Southwark who today said that the Labour Government's record was inadequate, but that this Government's record was considerably worse? Does he accept that pensioners in Britain are worse off than pensioners in any other state in the European Community?

Mr. Fowler: I shall do a deal with the hon. Gentleman. Rather than leaving the doors of my office, I will open the doors of my office and he can bring a delegation of pensioners to see me.

Mr. Hughes: The only problem is that the Minister's colleagues might be a little perturbed to see 700 pensioners coming up the escalators at Alexander Fleming house. However, if the offer is on, I shall certainly accept it.

Mr. Fowler: The offer is on, and I should be delighted to see a representative delegation.
I say that Conservative Members are not prepared to accept lectures from the hon. Member for Oldham, West for three major reasons. First, the motion that stands in the name of the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues is headed:
Pensioners' Loss of Purchasing Power.
The hon. Gentleman in his speech ranged from the new method of uprating to the changes in housing benefit. I shall come to those points, because they are clearly important.
If this debate is about living standards, I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman's starting point would have been the rate of inflation. The fact that inflation is down to levels not experienced since the 1960s is surely one of the Government's main dramatic achievements and contributions to the living standards of retired people who, all too often in the past, saw their savings slashed in real value. The single greatest threat to the financial security of old people is the prospect of a return to the levels of inflation which so ravaged the country in the mid-1970s.
There was a period when that fact was recognised by the Labour Front Bench. The White Paper "The Attack on Inflation" published in July 1975 noted that prices had risen by 25 per cent.
In unequivocal terms it declared:
This must not go on. Failure to control inflation would mean massive and indiscriminate cuts in public expenditure with crippling damage to the social services. Success in controlling inflation is the best guarantee against this.
That statement is as true today as it was then.
The tragedy of the Labour party is that the bitter truths that were learnt then have been forgotten, but the people of this country have not forgotten that the previous Labour Government presided over a rise in prices of 110 per cent. That is particularly true of retired people who, as my hon. Friend the Member for Edgbaston said, saw the real value of their savings eroded and the security of their fixed incomes shattered.
It is fair to say that retired people expect the Government to protect their savings, and I believe that the Government have a duty to do that. It is not enough for any Government to say that they have kept national insurance pensions in line with the cost of living index and to ignore the rate of price increases. If inflation rises at 20 per cent. a year, that not only erodes savings and eats into occupational pensions—many occupational pensions are not index linked—but it destroys the base of industry from which the resources for social provision can come.
Any Government who are serious about maintaining pensioners' living standards must also be serious about reducing inflation in this country. The public can judge for themselves in which party they have the most confidence.
I cannot accept the charges made by the Opposition, even on their own terms. I accept that the Government have responsibility to provide not just for national insurance pensions but for extra help for those who need it. The facts are that, in spite of the worst recession since the end of the second world war, we are currently spending £35 billion a year on the social security budget. As a result of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's statement last week net spending next year will increase to almost £37 billion. By any standard, that is an enormous budget, amounting to nearly 30 per cent. of all public spending. Over half of that is devoted to pensioners and the elderly.

Mr. David Winnick: Does the Minister accept that the increases in fuel prices will be a nightmare for many pensioners during the winter? Do the Government intend to help any of the 2 million pensioners who are not on supplementary benefit but are in receipt of rent and rate rebates and do not receive a penny towards their fuel bills? Does he recognise the hardship, nightmares and agony suffered by those who cannot afford an increase in fuel prices? The price of gas has increased by 116 per cent. during the past four years, which is double the increase in the retail price index.

Mr. Fowler: I recognise those problems. I hope that the hon. Gentleman recognises that expenditure on heating additions will be about £100 million more this year in real terms than during the last year of the Labour Government.
It is important to say that the improvement in benefits payable from this week means that the Government have more than fulfilled their pledge to protect the real value of pensions. This week's uprating takes the pension 75 per cent. above the rate in November 1978. Over the same period the retail price index increased by about 70 per cent.
We have raised the capital limit for supplementary pensions by 20 per cent. to £3,000. We have also increased the single payments limit and introduced a £1,500 disregard of the surrender value of life assurance policies. In the last Budget, tax thresholds were increased, benefiting people on lower incomes and taking about 1·25 million people out of tax altogether—and many of those were pensioners. The hon. Member for Oldham, West will have heard the Chancellor of the Exchequer's statement


last week. He will know, therefore, that we have made provision for not only pensions but other benefits—supplementary benefit, unemployment benefit and child benefit—which will be increased in line with prices next year.

Mr. Jeff Rooker: Will the Secretary of State assure the House that in operating the commitment that he has just given about the increase in benefit next year there will be no fudging of figures as in the cuts in this week's increase to pensioners with children and widowed mothers?

Mr. Fowler: There will be no fudging of figures. I can also give an assurance on one of the points raised by the hon. Member for Oldham, West about widows. We do not intend to change the position of widows.

Mr. Rooker: I said "widowed mothers."

Mr. Fowler: We had to make some economies in this year's budget. We made no secret of it. It would have been remarkable in a budget of £37 billion had we not. The hon. Member for Oldham, West must remember that expenditure on housing benefit currently amounts to something approaching £4 billion. It goes to almost 7 million households and affects 21 million people. The changes to come into effect next April will amount to less than 5 per cent. of total spending and will leave 6·3 million households receiving help. Moreover, we have specifically designed the changes to protect poorer households, and that includes the pensioners.
The hon. Gentleman made the further point that we have changed the system of uprating, from the forecast to the historic or actual method, to the disadvantage of pensioners. I have already touched on the reasons why we moved to the forecast system in the first place. If anyone wants confirmation of the motivation of the then Labour Government for that change, he has only to read the memoirs of the former Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Lord Barnett, who said:
The reason was simple: with inflation forecast to show a substantial fall, if we had not made such a change, we would be increasing pensions and other benefits by nearly 30 per cent.
There is no doubt why the Labour Government moved that way. They moved for no reason other than to make a once and for all saving at the expense of pensioners. What also became clear later was that the forecast method with which they then lumbered the country was more often wrong than right. During the past seven years, forecasts have been wrong five times. Sometimes there has been an overestimate and sometimes an underestimate of inflation. The measure used to determine pensions and benefits for millions of people was shown to be three times more likely to be wrong than right.
So in the Social Security and Housing Benefits Act which we introduced in April this year, the system was changed and we returned to the actual method of measurement. In other words, we have the benefit of an exact measurement of inflation between May in one year and May in another, and that figure becomes available in June and forms the basis of the November uprating.
If I may say so, there is one significant difference between our proposal and what the Labour Government did in 1976. In 1976, the Labour Government made a once and for all saving. There was no way in which pensioners

could ever catch up with the £500 million that they had lost. By definition, as the hon. Gentleman said, under our system if there should be an increase in inflation between May and the November uprating, it is automatically taken account of in the following uprating. These arguments were fully and extensively debated earlier this year, as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Bar (Mr. Rooker) would be the first to confirm, not only in the House, but throughout the general election campaign. There was nothing hidden about the change.
There is one further important point that I should like to make. There are wider issues involving pensions policy. The decisions that we take now affect the entitlement of people in 20, 30 or 40 years' time. The hon. Member for Oldham, West is clearly right to be concerned about this year's uprating of national insurance pensions, but it is surely also right for him to be concerned about future generations of pensioners. There was little mention in his speech of occupational pensions.
At present 11·5 million people in this country are covered by occupational pensions. It is right that their interests should be protected as well, and that was at least part of the intention of the Social Security Pensions Act 1975. Like the hon. Member for Oldham, West, I pay tribute to Brian O'Malley for his work on that Act. The Conservative party, then in opposition, gave an unopposed Second Reading to that measure. We did so because on pensions policy it is necessary to have a degree of agreement between parties on the way ahead. Prior to that legislation various schemes had been put forward but had perished. There was the Crossman scheme and the scheme of my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, North-East (Sir K. Joseph). We on this side of the House—and I was chief Opposition spokesman at that time—took the view that this uncertainty could not go on. We sought the views of the pensions industry, which overwhelmingly advised that we should proceed on the basis of the proposals contained in the 1975 Bill and that there should be a firm long-term basis for pensions development.

Mr. Bidwell: rose—

Mr. Fowler: The result has been a partnership between the Government and the occupational schemes in the provision of pensions. That partnership has been to the overwhelming benefit of the public.
Although occupational pensions matters are generally negotiated and financed by employers and employees, the Government have a role to play in this area. Most employees in occupational schemes have no option but to join the schemes as part of their contracts of service. The Government, therefore, cannot turn a blind eye when members join schemes with apparently favourable terms only to find the unfairness of those terms should they later leave that particular job. Basically that is the position of early leavers at the moment. The problem is that someone who leaves a scheme and goes to another job often leaves behind him a pension entitlement, but that entitlement is frozen until the age of retirement. Alternatively, if he transfers his pension, the transfer value also reflects the frozen rights. I do not believe that that position can be justified. In its 1981 report the Occupational Pensions Board declared that it remained a fact that many early leavers lose and often lose substantially and that it cannot be just that early leavers from pension schemes should suffer in relation to those who stay.
Because of this concern, in September I convened a conference on early leavers. I do not pretend that there is complete agreement, but there is now a wide consensus and acceptance that reform is needed.

Mr. Bidwell: rose—

Mr. Fowler: Consequently the Government have now decided that it would be right to legislate at the next suitable opportunity.
The legislative changes we propose will be broadly on the lines of the Occupational Pensions Board's majority recommendation. They will require schemes to revalue pension rights of future early leavers up to the time when they take their pension by 5 per cent. a year or, if prices rise by less than 5 per cent., by that amount. Next week I shall be issuing a consultative document setting out the Government's proposals in greater detail, and I should like to have reactions and comments by the end of February so that we can keep open the option, which has many attractions, of legislating in the next Session.

Mr. Bidwell: We accept, because of the forward-looking projects with which the right hon. Gentleman has been dealing, that under any future Government pensioners, in relation to the rest of the country, will be better off because improvements in occupational pension schemes are proceeding apace. But the immediate problem involves those who had no chance of contributing in a substantial way to occupational pension schemes. Does the Minister accept that the more the value of the state retirement pension is eroded, flattened out or sustained, the greater will be the administrative costs of seeing whether people are entitled to supplementary benefit? The myriad extra benefits available to people struggling for dignity will mean more administrative costs. Has the Department taken that on board? I do not think that the previous Labour Government went into it exhaustively.

Mr. Fowler: The adequacy of pension provision now and in the future is a fundamental matter with which any Government must be concerned. I shall return to that point.

Mr. Meacher: The Secretary of State is apparently using the opportunity of the debate to make an important statement about the early leaver problem. Will he undertake to make a formal statement to the House, because there are many other issues, such as disclosure of information and the policing and regulation of schemes, on which the House has a right to question him? Will he make a statement on another occasion?

Mr. Fowler: I cannot give that undertaking, but it is fair in a debate on pensions for me to announce the Government's pensions policy. If I do not have many more interruptions, the hon. Gentleman and other hon. Members who wish to take part in the debate will have a full three and a half hours to go over this point. I will do what I can to provide further information to the hon. Gentleman. I stand by what I said. It is important in this area to have as much agreement as possible. I appreciate and understand that there will be differences between us on pensions policy, but it is important to try to seek as much agreement as we can.
A linked area in which we look for improvement in the operation of occupational pension schemes is the disclosure of information to members, to which the hon. Member for Oldham, West has just referred. It is

important that members of pension schemes should not only be provided with full information about their individual rights, particularly when they change jobs, but have access to information about the general situation of the scheme, as revealed by the audited accounts, actuarial valuations, annual trustee reports, investment reports and so on. There should be as much information as possible. That was the subject of a further report by the Occupational Pensions Board in 1982. At the time of publication I said that the Government accepted in principle the need to legislate on the disclosure of information to members of occupational pension schemes.
I also announced the setting up of a working party of officials to consider the pensions law. I am considering its conclusions, which also cover the possibility of a register of occupational pension schemes, the need for trustees' and employers' responsibilities to be clarified, and the issue of supervision. I shall also pay careful attention to the outcome of Professor Gower's study on the protection of investors in, and beneficiaries from, pension funds. When I have seen those proposals—which I understand will be ready very shortly—I intend again to publish a consultative paper with the aim of starting the consultative process early in 1984 so that those disclosure measures might be included in the legislation proposed for early leavers.
That much has been decided for legislation on early leavers and disclosure. But one of the proposals that is now attracting a great deal of attention is the proposal that individuals, if they wish, may be given the chance to have their own personalised pensions. This includes the proposal for personal and portable pensions, which has been put forward by, among others, Mr. Nigel Vinson. The aim is to encourage schemes in which the individual member knows what his personal stake in the pension fund is and can identify the units of pension wealth that he has built up. At the minimum, this would promote greater interest in the development and investment of funds, but the ultimate aim would be that people leaving a job would be able to take with them the pension wealth that they had built up in that scheme.
The debate that has been opened up by this proposal for a portable pension scheme has demonstrated not only that the concept has considerable attractions to many people, but that there are considerable practical problems to be overcome. For example, there is the old problem and question of contracting-out conditions, and the whole issue of the employer's contribution. Nevertheless, I believe that this proposal deserves careful study, and it comes together with a number of other very important questions that will require decisions in the coming years in relation to state and occupational pensions. There are the questions of pension age, of the balance between the working population and the retired population and of demographic growth. Those issues will crucially affect the expectations of millions of people for 20, 30, 40 years ahead.
Accordingly, the Government believe that it is the right time to set up a special inquiry into provision for retirement, which I shall be chairing, which will study the future development, adequacy and costs of state, occupational and private provisions for retirement in the United Kingdom, including the portability of pension rights, and consider possible changes in those arrangements, taking account of the recommendations of the Select Committee on Social Services in its report on retirement age.
The House has the benefit of the report of the Select Committee on Social Services on pension age, but the decisions to be faced could obviously involve substantial costs to be borne by future generations of contributors, and that cannot be considered in isolation from other pensions issues. The House will be debating the matter on Friday, when my hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Sir D. Price) moves the Second Reading of his Bill on pension age. I shall tomorrow publish the Government's response to that Select Committee report, and that will make it clear that the report will form an integral part of the inquiry.
Another important issue concerns changes that might occur in the age structure of the population in the next 40 years, and, if I may say so, it is important to look carefully at the position. The present projections show a patchwork that falls as well as rises in the numbers of old people relative to the rest of the population. The number of people over 65, having risen by more than one third in the past 20 years, will now remain more or less stable as a proportion of the population until about 2010. Thereafter, indications are that the proportion of elderly people will increase quite rapidly.
Estimates of future pension costs must also depend on assumptions about matters such as the future age structure of the population. But they also depend on other assumptions—for instance, about price and earnings increases. I will illustrate this from the recent report by the Government Actuary on long-term pension costs—a subject about which the hon. Member for Perry Barr often talks. On the least favourable assumption about the real increase in earnings, the Government Actuary's report shows that class 1 contribution rates would increase from 15·4 per cent. now to 21·9 per cent. in 2025. On another assumption—that the real increase in earnings is in line with the historic growth of 2 per cent. and that the pension remains price-protected—the contribution rate would fall in the same period to 13·5 per cent. That underlines the importance of reviewing the whole position carefully before reaching conclusions, and that basically is what the inquiry will be about.
The membership of the inquiry will include Ministers from the other Departments most concerned, the Government Actuary and figures outside the Government. I am not giving a comprehensive list, but they will include people such as Mr. Stewart Lyon, president of the Institute of Actuaries; Mr. Marshall Field, chairman of the joint working group of the main occupational pensions organisations; and the eminent economist, Professor Alan Peacock.
There is I think one other important point to make. No one can doubt the public importance of pensions policy. These are important issues for public debate, and accordingly I shall conduct the inquiry as openly as possible. The public, employers, unions and pension interests will all be invited to express their views, and they will be free to make their evidence public. Certainly we will also expect to have some public sessions, but I do not envisage this inquiry going on for years. My aim is to produce conclusions—for example, on portable pensions—by the spring. I hope that the inquiry will be completed by next summer or autumn, and following that the Government will publish their conclusions as soon as possible.

Mrs. Jill Knight: Will my right hon,. Friend make sure that when the inquiry is at work it looks with a very jaundiced eye indeed at some of the figures that were put forward today by the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher), who said that in Birmingham hundreds of thousands of pensioners were in difficulty over their rents—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I have checked the figures. Considering the size of the population of Birmingham and the fact that 40 per cent. of households may be receiving housing benefit, it would be impossible for the figure to be anywhere near that mentioned by the hon. Gentleman, even if no cases had been settled, but I know from experience that many have been settled.

Mr. Fowler: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I am sure that the point she raised will be mentioned in the debate.
Provision for retirement is an issue in which hon. Members in all parts of the House have an interest. We have a duty to satisfy ourselves that the pension promises of today can become the pension payments of tomorrow. My aim in setting up an inquiry is not to call into question the fundamental pensions structure that was established in the 1970s with all-party agreement, and to which I was a party. Rather, it is to ensure that our pensions structure is soundly based, that it is fair as between contributors and beneficiaries as well as between all scheme members and that it continues to command the support of the community as a whole.
A responsible Government must look ahead. Only in that way can we be sure that successive generations of pensioners get the pensions that they need and deserve. We stand by what this Government have done for pensioners since 1979, and I want to see that record maintained for future generations of pensioners.

Mr. Donald Stewart: The Secretary of State based much of his defence of the Government on the need to keep inflation down, and pensioners, like the rest of us, are happy to see inflation coming down. However, that is not sufficient to answer the charge that is being levelled against the Government in this debate.
Special housing, day care, residential and other facilities for pensioners are already inadequate. The social benefits system is already under strain and attack, and it also is inadequate. If there are problems now, there will be much greater problems in a few years. By 1986, there will a large bulge in the aged population, and in Scotland 864,000 people will fall into that category. In the following years, an increasing proportion of the population will be becoming elderly with a smaller proportion of the economically active population supporting them. If unemployment figures are not drastically reduced, the system will be even more insupportable.
The most suitable accommodation for the growing number of frail and elderly people in Scotland will be sheltered houses and, in some cases, residential care. Officially, it is necessary to have 50 sheltered houses per 1,000 people aged 65 and over. In my view, this is a gross under-estimation of needs, given the appalling housing conditions that many old people must endure.
According to "Scottish Housing Statistics" and the "Scottish Abstract of Statistics", the 1983 edition, 9,458 sheltered houses provided 15,500 places in 1981. I doubt that conditions have improved dramatically during the past couple of years. Perhaps the Minister will enlighten us on


that point. According to projected 1986 figures for the elderly in Scotland, we shall need 56,200 sheltered housing places. That is judged by the official standard of 65 places per 1,000 people aged 65 and over.
The current level of pensions is scandalous. Old people have always been under-provided with pensions by Tory and Labour Governments. The Government's latest trick is extremely nasty. They decided that the increase in pensions which occurs in the autumn should be based on the inflation rate until May 1983. The rate of inflation until May 1983 was 3·7 per cent. Expecting that the rate of inflation would be higher in November 1983—it is now about 5 per cent.—the Government followed that decision and did the pensioners out of their money. Pension payments have fallen behind inflation and pensioners are now worse off for the third consecutive year.
The Government have sunk fairly low at times, but this must be one of the lowest and meanest tricks to date. This example of hypocrisy is outlined by the fact that the Government in their 1983 manifesto state:
In the next Parliament we shall continue to protect retirement pensions and other linked long-term benefits against rising prices.
After this highway robbery, the unforunate pensioners are expected to be duly thankful to the Government for their Christmas bonus. With a Santa Claus like the Chancellor of the Exchequer, few pensioners can look forward to a happy new year in 1984.
Last year in Norway the state pension was equivalent to £49 for a single person and £80 for a married couple. This year, the figures were £52 and £82 respectively. Meanwhile, in Scotland, which is also an oil country—it is an oil-exploited country—pensions have been £33 and £53 respectively. The Scottish National party has long supported a substantial increase in pensions, at least to Norwegian levels, for our old people in Scotland. We have the wealth to do it. Only Westminster holds us back from implementing progressive social policies in Scotland.
It is bad enough for pensioners in England to cope with the present situation and the Government, but it is generally harder for pensioners in Scotland. There are two reasons. First, the price of everyday foodstuffs and other commodities is higher in Scotland. According to official answers given in the House, it is consistently 3 per cent. higher than the United Kingdom average. In some parts of Scotland, the price is considerably higher. In my constituency, in Benbecula, the cost of everyday shopping and services is 16 per cent. above the United Kingdom average. This level of price hardship is found elsewhere in rural Scotland. How can Scottish pensioners, never mind working people, cope with such a situation? Many pensioners are on supplementary benefits. In Glasgow, 27 per cent. of pensioners are on supplementary benefit. That shows how bad the situation is.
Secondly, heating bills are higher in Scotland. To heat a comparable house in Scotland to the same temperature in winter as in the south of England takes much more energy, and that must be paid for. In Glasgow, heating a comparable house takes at least 20 per cent. more energy, and in Aberdeen at least 30 per cent. more energy, than in the south of England.
The Scottish National party has often called for a cold climate allowance to be paid to pensioners and other households on supplementary benefit. The automatic payment of such an allowance would equalise living

conditions for those in colder areas and would go a long way towards preventing the series of tragic hypothermia deaths about which we read in our constituencies every winter.
Other measures could be undertaken to enhance and improve the lives of our pensioners—the abolition of standing charges for pensioner households on gas and the introduction of concessionary television licences for pensioners. Surely that is not beyond the Government's resources, even in the present climate. When a Bill was introduced in October 1982 by the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. McKay) and supported by my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, East (Mr. Wilson) and me, no Scottish Tories, Liberals or SDP Members bothered to support it. No doubt, some of them were against it. In a country as potentially prosperous as this—although not at present because of our difficulties—the Government could surely go some way towards alleviating the hard struggle that nearly all pensioners are facing. I therefore support the motion.

Mr. Robert McCrindle: As one who has for many years been at the forefront of those who see the need to improve the lot of members of occupational pension schemes who change their jobs, I warmly welcome the Secretary of State's announcement that he is contemplating legislation along the lines of the Occupational Pensions Board report that was made some time ago. There can be no doubt that, when mobility of labour is becoming increasingly important, the prospect of losing out pension rights is a serious disincentive. Having sometimes felt that I was fighting a one-man campaign, I am delighted that I have been able to persuade my right hon. Friend that the time is ripe to move forward. I could not have been more pleased to hear his announcement.
I am also pleased that the Secretary of State is to mount this wide-ranging inquiry into the future and status of pension provision and its financing. It is wise to encourage the public to engage in the widest possible discussion of the problems that lie ahead, although I in no way concede the point made by the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) that this is another way of saying that the Government are intent on cutting pension entitlements. We do not have to accept that to welcome the wide-ranging inquiry announced by my right hon. Friend.
The House will appreciate that I did not have any knowledge that the subject of portable pensions would be announced by the Secretary of State this afternoon. My right hon. Friend is right in wanting further inquiries into the advantages and—I must be fair—the disadvantages of this imaginative idea. He and I are united in the desire to increase what we choose to call the property-owning democracy by encouraging the development of one's own pot of gold. That can best be achieved by a measure along the lines of the portable pensions idea which has gained currency in 1983.
Pensioners' living standards are at the heart of the debate and a wide range of the main arguments will no doubt be rehearsed today. Front Bench spokesmen on both sides have certainly done that. I shall concentrate on three key issues, which I concede are among the most emotive of the topics to be discussed today—heating costs, concessionary bus fare schemes and supplementary benefits for the elderly.
Hypothermia is not just an emotive word which conjures up feelings of revulsion and distaste in all parts of the House. It can be ended only if we continue to move in the direction in which, as I shall try to prove, the Government are already travelling. The essential element in the prevention of hypothermia is the provision of adequate heating. That may seem so obvious as not to need repeating. Nevertheless, it is important to stress that, and to emphasise that the Government's policy in the whole sphere of social service provision is to give priority to those in greatest need. There can be no doubt that people suffering from or threatened by hypothermia fall into that category.
Overall, the Conservative Government are providing more help with heating costs than did the Labour Government. I do not enjoy putting the argument in a partisan way, but as the hon. Member for Oldham, West, for perfectly understandable reasons, chose to argue in that way it is so some extent incumbent on Government supporters to reply in the same vein.

Mr. Archy Kirkwood: What about gas prices?

Mr. McCrindle: If hon. Members will be patient, I shall come to that. I make that comment not as a parliamentary device but because I intend to deal with gas prices shortly.
Basic heating additions are now paid automatically to householders on supplementary benefit who are aged 70 or over. That was introduced by the Conservative Administration in 1980. A heating addition is now paid to 90 per cent. of supplementary benefit pensioners. The Conservatives thus provide more help with heating costs in both real and cash terms than the Labour Government did, as I sought to prove with the statistics that I quoted in my intervention in the speech of the hon. Member for Oldham, West. There has been a substantial increase in the heating addition since 1978, with two higher rates being consolidated into one.
I promise not to bore the House with too many statistics, but one or two are helpful at this stage. The increase in the heating addition at November 1983 is 8·6 per cent. That is higher than the rate of inflation and takes into account the disproportionate rise in some elements of fuel costs. The basic rate in 1979 was 95p per week. It is now £2·05 per week. The higher rate was £1·95 or £2·85 in November 1979. It is now £5·05 per week. The increase of 8·6 per cent. will protect the poorest pensioners—those on supplementary benefit—against the rises in electricity prices.
I promised to deal with the gas and electricity price rises now in the offing. I make no secret of the fact that I should have preferred the prospective increases to be avoided, if that had been at all possible. Nevertheless, the increases are likely to be less than the rate of inflation. That may not justify the price rises, but it brings them more into perspective than is likely to be the case in speeches from the Opposition.
The news today that the electricity industry is considering efficiency improvements and economies which could prevent increases in costs is greatly to be welcomed. The Daily Telegraph reports that the electricity industry's review is evidence that not only will the Government have the right to insist on increased efficiency

from nationalised industries but that efficiency can increase savings and thereby benefit pensioners as well as other consumers.
The right hon. Member for Western Isles (Mr. Stewart) raised the question of standing charges. This applies not only to pensioners on supplementary benefit but to all pensioners and other consumers. I shall concentrate on its effect on pensioners across the board. I ask the gas and electricity undertakings to recognise that if, as a result of Government decisions, it is necessary to increase gas and electricity charges the whole relationship of standing charges to the cost of these basic fuels to the consumer should be examined. I suspect that there can be no greater resentment than that felt by people on low incomes, be they pensioners or otherwise, who have economised in the use of gas and electricity but find that their bills are still dwarfed by the standing charges. If the cost per therm or per unit has to be increased, this is surely an opportunity for the gas and electricity undertakings to consider carefully whether a better balance can be achieved. If I am challenged to say whether that means a slightly higher charge per therm or per unit, I cannot have it both ways. I must concede that that is indeed my proposition to the House and to the gas and electricity undertakings.
Hypothermia is a particular problem at this time of year and the Government have taken steps to prevent pensioners from suffering its effects, but there are other areas of policy in which the Government believe that local authorities are more able than central Government to help. Transport is one such area.
As I have said before, I oppose a national concessionary fares scheme which would extend to all pensioners irrespective of their financial or physical circumstances. It is sometimes overlooked that such a national scheme, which would have to be paid for and might mean a reduction in benefits in other areas, would bring no benefit to the bedridden, to those who are disabled and unable to use public transport or to those who for one reason or another do not wish to use it. None of those people would obtain the benefit that is often adduced for the introduction of such a scheme.
In my ideal world we should press for disproportionately larger increases in the pension itself and leave behind the tendency in recent years to decide how pensioners ought to spend their money. That is not the function of Government. Ideally, the whole principle of such concesssionary schemes should be abandoned. I have to be a realist. I recognise, from experience of my constituency, the popularity of such concessionary schemes. I suppose that I shall have to accept that there is no way of terminating them, because they have become so much a part of the social fabric of pensioners' lives in many parts of the country.
The provisions of concessionary schemes can be arranged much better by local authorities. There will be envy if a pensioner resident in one local authority area gets poor concessionary rates, or, sometimes, none at all, when those living just along the road have a good scheme. I accept that there will be unevenness. Equally, I accept that what is necessary and possible in terms of the cost to the ratepayer will be much more easily ascertainable if the matter is kept in the hands of local authorities rather than introduced as a national scheme.

Mr. Donald Stewart: Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the provision of many schemes costs the local


authorities nothing? The buses, trains, boats and, sometimes, aeroplanes, have vacant seats, and should be available for old-age pensioners.

Mr. McCrindle: I have heard that argument many times. I am fair-minded enough to recognise that there is something in it. With the greatest respect to the right hon. Gentleman, it does not go the whole way to answer the objections that I have tried to raise this evening. I have to say that, although there are superficial attractions in the introduction of a national scheme, it would be costly and unfair in some respects to a sizeable section of the population who could not take advantage of it.
For those reasons, and because local authorities are better able to assess the needs of their areas, I should much prefer to leave the matter in their hands. I hope that we shall not continue to add to the number of concessionary schemes introduced through the Government. It is an affront to old people to assume that Parliament necessarily knows better than they do how they want to spend their money. I hope that I have conveyed my preference. I support the Government's broad objective of encouraging local authorities to introduce concessionary fare schemes.
The division across the Chamber is very real when we talk about health and social security benefits. Opposition Members seem to believe that we should for ever put up every social benefit to each person within a particular category. Therefore, they object to what they regard as selectivity. They prefer the universality of putting up benefits and then paying them to everyone, irrespective of need. That is a perfectly defensible position. However, the great divide that is always obvious whenever we debate these matters is between that approach and that of the Government, taken at a time when there are limited resources. Whatever anyone says, resources would still be limited if a Labour Government were in office today. In those circumstances, there is no alternative but to do the very best that we can, sometimes on a selective basis.
Let me give an example. Mention was made of the death grant. The hon. Member for Oldham, West expressed great distaste for the consultative document issued by the Government some time ago. At the heart of the document was the suggestion that it is ludicrous to pay a death grant of £30 in 1983, but that one way of paying a sum almost 10 times that amount to those in real need would be to introduce an element of selectivity. One idea was to pay 10 times that amount in respect of those whose next of kin are left with the responsibility for burial, and are receiving supplementary benefit. That is not the only way, but it was one suggestion. It was rejected by the Opposition. In the meantime, because they are not prepared to countenance the need for selectivity in benefits, the payment of £30 continues to all. That is totally inadequate for those who need it, and it comes willy-nilly to those, including hon. Members, who do not need it under any circumstances.
That is the great division. Although the Opposition hold their views strongly, I hope that they will understand that some Conservative Members who are known to speak on these matters have an equally sincere dedication to doing the best that we can within what we see to be the limited circumstances. If that is the yardstick, Her Majesty's Government have done pretty well so far.

Mr. Robert Litherland: I represent the inner city area of Manchester, which is no

different from any other city. There has been a mass exodus of young people, strong in wind and limb, talented and able. Such people have tended to leave the cities and go to pastures new, to the suburbs and new towns.
There has been a massive decline in manufacturing industry, and people have had to go in search of jobs. What is left in their wake, in inner cities such as Manchester, is a large percentage of people in desperate need. Many categories of people require the welfare services and rely on the services provided by the local authority. One such category is the elderly. There are many of them in the inner city of Manchester who, together with the unemployed, the low skilled, the young unemployed and the ethnic minorities, are victims of a double-edged attack on their livelihoods. One side of that attack is cuts in public expenditure, which have been discussed today. That is a backdoor and underhand tactic to cut facilities for the elderly. The other side of the attack is in the Government's policy for the elderly.
Manchester social services is proud of what it does. I used to say that one had to go outside the city to appreciate the facilities provided in Manchester. The chairman of the social services tells me that he is in the unenviable position of having to make a decision not on who benefits but on who suffers under the Government's enforced local authority cuts.
In the inner cities there is a high demand for home helps, meals on wheels and domiciliary services, but because of the Government's policy to cut finance, and now that we have the new terminology "natural wastage", there is a limited number of staff, and they have to spread their time thinly over the elderly people. Many of them now go wanting. That is not because Manchester social services or the city council is less caring than it was before, but because there is a lack of resources and facilities
Many of the elderly people whom I represent are now marooned in tower blocks. We had a policy to alter and restructure the tower blocks to provide sheltered accommodation, with community rooms, a warden service and all the facilities that the elderly need, but because of the cuts in the housing investment programme that is now a pipedream. The people who suffer are the elderly.
The elderly are the victims of bad housing. The package deals in which people must live have been discussed in the House over and over again. 'Chat is system-built rubbish with inefficient and costly heating systems. The elderly tenant is confronted with an astronomic fuel bill. How have the Government assisted? They have "assisted" the pensioner by increasing the price of gas and electricity. The result is a choice between spending on food and spending on fuel. The pensioner tries to economise, and the result is hardship. It can even mean death. It is estimated that about 600 pensioners die annually from hypothermia. The number who die from other cold-induced illnesses may well run into thousands.
The case of one elderly person comes to my mind. I went to her flat to see what the problem was. She was living in a damp-ridden, condensation-filled room. She could not pay the fuel bill because she was living in the type of development I have described. She was using a paraffin heater. She asked whether I could get the room decorated before her husband came back from hospital where he was dying of cancer. It was necessary to bring in the direct labour department to refurnish the room simply to enable an elderly person to die in dignity. That


is what some of the elderly are experiencing in my constituency. What a way to treat the most vulnerable sections of our society.
Pensioners living alone tell me they have less money to spend. They certainly have less money to spend than married couples, but their heating requirements may be even greater. They may need more bodily warmth. Old single people need even more bodily warmth. They may need to heat more than one room. Winter is a frightening time of year for elderly people who do not know whether they will come through it. It is no fault of their own; it is sheer neglect.
In Manchester sheltered accommodation for the elderly was thought to be a great success. Yet these people find they have to pay not only for their own heating costs but, because of a switch in financing, for the heating of corridors, common rooms and the overall cost of the building. That cost comes out of their meagre pensions.
Those people are luckier than pensioners living alone in my constituency who suffer from the cold and die alone. Mr. Jack Jones is absolutely correct when he says that old people are dying simply through neglect.
In "Caring for Old People" the Government said:
The Government's overall priority is to reduce and contain inflation. As the economy improves elderly people will share in that improvement. In the meantime we have to hold back public spending and concentrate on the revival of the economy.
That was the Government's message to pensioners in 1981.
Public spending has been cut and the economy is in ruins. Its status is stagnation. What faces the elderly at the bottom end of the scale? To them it means a decline into abject poverty. This is what the campaign for the elderly is trying to avoid.
What do elderly people receive after looking forward to retirement and doing their share for the country? They receive a pension that lags behind those in other European countries, whose links have been broken with earnings and prices, whose value should be about £16 higher for a single person and £20 higher for a married couple, and which means a further deterioration in their living standards. They are made to feel inferior, unwanted and a burden to society.
The idea of continuing to throw pensioners a few crumbs of comfort and acting in a charitable way may solve the problem, but that is not what they want. Pensioners want dignity and a feeling of belonging to society.
As more and more elderly people become aware of the injustice, they will make their voice heard. They do not want charity, simply their rights. They have earned them and they are our responsibility. The elderly have provided for us in the past and we should be providing for them for the future.
In recent months I dealt with elderly people who have accepted responsibility for burying their elderly relatives. In one case an elderly person's sister was in a private nursing home and they had not seen each other for years. On the death of the sister my constituent was found to be next-of-kin and this poor lady in her ignorance accepted the responsibility. In doing so she had to accept financing the funeral. Friends contacted the undertaker and the

funeral eventually took place. My constituent, a pensioner, was faced with a massive bill to cover that expense. She did not have the resources to pay.
What does £30 cover? The death grant would not bury even a pet budgie at today's funeral costs. It is inadequate to meet any funeral expenses. More and more elderly people are being conned into accepting responsibility only to find the undertaker knocking on the door and demanding his recompense. The Government have failed the elderly not only in the pension but in the death grant, community care, public transport and television licences. However, this neglect is being recognised by 11,500 pensioners and their voice will be heard.
Not only elderly pensioners are suffering. One of my constituents is a war pensioner. This lady, a Mrs. Hibbert of 48 Assheton Road, Newton Heath, Manchester, has just obtained a small warm flat. She has written to me saying:
Today I am 71 and 40 years of that I have been a war widow bringing up three daughters on the meagre pension that was awarded at that time. Now I am on my own trying to keep head above water which I do, still on the meagre pension, with a rise this year of about £1.30. To say I am disgusted is putting it very mildly indeed when you realise that if you have a retirement pension with your war pension you are barred from getting any help with heating and other things it makes life very hard trying to save for the heating bill. That is one reason I applied for this flat, so that I would have a warmer winter to look forward to".
That flat was provided not by the local authority but by the British Legion. Her husband was a Regular soldier who lost his life fighting for his country in 1944.
That is just one of the voices that are now being raised. When public opinion is on the side of the pensioners the roar will be deafening and I am afraid that the Government will have to listen.
I wish to commend the former Member for St. Pancras, North, Mr. Jock Stallard, who is now in another place, for his fight for the elderly and some advice that he gave us. He told us to recognise the need to look no further than our neighbour, the Republic of Ireland, which makes exemptions similar to those he sought in his Bill.
The Irish provide a free electricity allowance of 300 units for every two weeks of the six winter months as well as exemptions from standing charges and free television licences. The Irish economy cannot claim to be far richer than ours. Therefore, it may be in our interests and those of pensioners to examine the Irish schemes. The former Member for St. Pancras, North said that if they can do it in Ireland we can do it in this country. I know that there will be a fight outside the House, there will certainly be a fight in the Chamber, and people like the former Member for St. Pancras, North will be fighting in the other place.
I ask that we stop quoting statistics and using the pensioner merely as a political football. Pensioners must be treated with the dignity they deserve, and that means paying them a proper pension.

7 pm

Mr. Conal Gregory: I feel strongly that this is an appropriate subject on which to address the House in my first debate. I come before the House in all humility to represent the people of the magnificent city of York—a city of great antiquity with Roman and Viking influences and with schools dating from the seventh century that are almost as striking as its medieval centre. Yet the city has very much moved with the times by adapting itself during the Georgian and Victorian eras and by showing its practical care, usually based on strong, Christian, traditional values towards the old.
York's contribution to the community has embraced the foundation of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1831 and, this century, the formation of a distinguished university 20 years ago.
The care of the individual was very much the concern of the retiring Member for York, who represented the constituency since 1966, a fact that I generously acknowledge on behalf of the House. He took up many causes and won a special place of mention on an international stage, particularly in the new Commonwealth.
The city's thriving industries—confectionery, the railway, tourism, construction and insurance—will be an absorbing interest of mine. The diversity of industrial investment must be a priority for the next quarter of a century, and I shall do my best to encourage such growth against the background of a living city that continues to conserve the best of the past with the commercial viability of the present and future in mind.
The media, particularly the Yorkshire Evening Press and this year's new birth, BBC Radio York, rightly find much to comment upon for a city that is both ancient and modern. It is a mixture of narrow medieval streets, dominated by the largest and finest gothic cathedral north of the Alps—the scene of last Friday's glorious enthronement of the new archbishop, attended by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister among others. It is a city of elegant Georgian facades and characterful Victorian brick, the whole bisected by two rivers.
It is said that York is Britain's largest village. In that respect, I am pleased to know a great number of its inhabitants who are now of retirement age, and to have seen their lovingly cared for homes, both private and state, in which many are housed.
Turning more specifically to the debate, the Government can take the lead in rethinking society's attitudes to senior citizens. I urge them to seize the opportunity to give our elderly a higher priority in terms of their welfare and dignity. Both sides of the House realise that the legislation affecting pensioners contains unjust anomalies, and I hope that the Government will act to rectify that.
We shall witness a rapid growth in the number of very old and frail persons in Britain. By giving the estimated number for north Yorkshire, of which York is the principal conurbation, hon. Members will be made aware of the alarming increases that are predicted. There will be a 20 per cent. rise in the number of people aged 75 and over, from 46,100 in 1981 to 55,300 in 1991. Within that figure is a 42 per cent. increase in those aged 75 and over who live alone, from 8,300 two years ago to 11,800 in 18 years' time. There will be an even more drastic increase. A rise of 43 per cent. is estimated for those aged 85 and over, from 19,200 in 1981 to 27,400 by 1991. This demographic move requires the Government's urgent attention and they must think well beyond the traditional five-year period.
I urge the Government to ensure full transferability of pension rights for all members of occupational schemes who discontinue service. The pensions movement appears to have taken no effective action to deal with the problems confronted by a member of an occupational scheme who changes jobs during his working life. Such people need protection if we are to ensure proper job mobility and avoid penalising someone who reaches normal retirement age.
There are about 90,000 pension funds. The most effective way of giving statutory effect to my suggestion is for the Government to instruct the superannuation fund office of the Inland Revenue to approve only those deeds of trustees that increase either the transfer value or the value of deferred pensions by 5 per cent. per annum, as recommended by the Occupational Pensions Board. That my be adequate today when we have a low rate of inflation, but any scheme must ensure that the final pension provided protects the individual against the ravages of inflation.
The Government must look again at the earnings level in respect of retirement pensions. That is particularly iniquitous on so-called "unearned" income, which is effectively "savings" income. We must raise the thresholds. The limit has been increased by £7 to £65 this month, but it must be kept under constant review and, I hope, finally abolished.
In 1979, the Conservative manifesto pledged that we would phase out the earnings rule. It stated:
It is wrong to discourage people who wish to work after retirement age, and we will phase out the 'earnings rule' during the next Parliament".
That pledge was repeated in the 1983 manifesto, which contained the phrase:
as soon as we can".
However, the figure has not been increased in line with inflation.
Pensioners over 80 years of age have received a relatively mean 25p extra a week since 1971. That would now be more than £1 a week if it were to be increased in line with inflation. Constituents have told me that they find that small element degrading.
The Christmas bonus has not been missed, as it was under another party in 1975, 1976 and almost in 1978. We honour our commitments. If updated in line with inflation, the bonus would now be worth £38.
We Conservatives recognise the energy needs of the elderly, especially during prolonged winters. The hon. Member for Manchester, Central (Mr. Litherland) said that many old people live in properties that are insufficiently heated or which were constructed at a time when oil and electricity were low-cost fuels. I ask the Minister to re-examine the statutory fuel allowance to see whether it goes far enough. Many consider that it is wholly inadequate in the light of today's high fuel costs. Heating allowances should be extended to those receiving housing benefit. The Government should also take account of the sense of injustice felt by those who pay standing charges on relatively small amounts of fuel.
Often, the elderly live in older draughty property and are unable to find the extra money to pay for insulation. Insulation schemes could be better publicised. The Government could do more to help, and the conditions under which insulation grants are given could be extended. At present, such grants are rigidly available only for lofts without insulation. They should be extended to all homes, even to those with a little insulation. It should be remembered that even in the 1970s insulation standards were less stringent than we demand today. As the all-party Energy Select Committee recommended last year, the Government could pay the costs of insulation for poor households.
No pensioner should be disconnected by a fuel board. Fear of disconnection is widespread throughout the country. If the disconnection of pensioners were


abolished, debts could still be reclaimed through the courts, and at least some pensioners might not be as fearful as they now are of using fuel.
We should not forget those pensioners who, additionally, are blind and disabled. They face extra costs, such as equipment, because of their disabilities, especially if they are not eligible for extra benefits through supplementary pensions.
They cannot obtain a suitable form of work to supplement their pension. Prior to retirement, such people often secure low-paid jobs and therefore cannot afford superannuation arrangements. Furthermore, the blind and the disabled often retire early and their state pension is reduced.
Several hon. Members have referred to the death grant. In view of my interest in this subject, it is appropriate for me to refer to it. The death grant was foreshadowed 41 years ago in the Beveridge report. Reform of the national insurance death grant is long overdue. However tenuous, it is a contributory benefit. The subject is usually raised at the most distressing time—when a close loved one has died. The full rate of £30 has remained unchanged since 1967, and is one of the lowest in the EC. West Germany's death grant is £26·01p.
The British death grant has increased only twice since the inception of the national insurance scheme. It covers barely 10 per cent. of the cost of a funeral. Families often need assistance with funeral costs. I have been told that widows fear that they may be unable to leave sufficient money to pay for their own funerals. As a consequence, they deprive themselves of food and fuel in an endeavour to save for that purpose. While I recognise that we cannot restore the purchasing power of the grant to its 1949 value, which would cost the exchequer £100 million on a universal basis, priority must be given to those who most require assistance, rather than to maintaining the present scheme, which applies to 90 per cent. of recorded deaths, and costs £10 million to administer.
The Government should re-examine the possibility of making income tax concessions to those who wish to prepay their notional interest accrued on the sum pre-paid each year until the funeral takes place. I commend that novel and enterprising scheme to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It would assist in the development of specific insurance policies to fund funerals and cause less distress to the elderly. The consultation period ended in July 1982. However, no Government action has taken place despite the presentation of a petition containing 1 million signatures urging improvements in the death grant made in January 1981.
About 22,900 people are in receipt of mobility allowance. That allowance suffers from an arbitrary rule that application must be made before one reaches the age of 65. I have witnessed the distress that the rule has caused to some of my constituents. It is fully appreciated that, initially, the Government cannot provide an allowance to those who suffer from degenerative conditions owing to old age. We should give a mobility allowance to those who are diagnosed after the age of 65 as having specific neurological conditions or other grossly incapacitating diseases. The elderly person, armed with the mobility allowance, could make donations to friends towards petrol costs, or could afford a hire car when necessary.
I commend the work of the Government and local authorities in many aspects of community care, especially home helps—by September 1981 the number of home helps had risen to more than 48,000—the meals on wheels service, the so-called bath ladies, the district nurses—which cost £2·2 million in 1981–82—the laundry service for the incontinent, and community physiotherapy to improve and maintain mobility and advise relatives on how best to care for the elderly. If the Government are to provide more community care, the elderly could be looked after at home. We must foster voluntary bodies that help to transport the elderly to doctors and others, and we must assist with the provision of telephones.
The next stage is to foster the construction of privately run homes, be they old people's homes or sheltered housing with a warden and a built-in alarm system, that are easy to run and self-contained. The Abbeyfield Society, founded in 1959, is probably the best known of its type in Britain, and caters for 6,000 people.
Day centres enable pensioners to be looked after while remaining in their home environment. They provide an opportunity to give the elderly attention on a cost-effective basis. Many such centres receive visits from chiropodists and physiotherapists. Their early work can save disproportionate costs incurred at a later stage in a person's medical life. Above all, the day centres, which cater for more than 38,500 elderly people, provide fellowship. I am a frequent visitor to St. Sampson's social centre in York and I know what a lively base it is. More than 1,000 elderly people visit the centre daily, which is housed in a redundant church. There is a national demand for more places. I applaud the voluntary bodies that are working towards expanding day centres.
The joint financing between health and social services has assisted the development of such projects as increasing the number of home helps. This means an increased longterm commitment as local authorities take over the responsibilities and costs. Over a five year period, the local authorities will pick up the tab. Bearing in mind the substantial number of people who will reach pensionable age and live long into old age, I urge the Government to make the necessary resources available and to co-ordinate the caring agencies that deal with the problem.
By supporting the amendment I believe that we shall continue to give our support to a just cause and be seen to do so by those most in need.

Mr. Archy Kirkwood: It is a great honour and privilege to follow the hon. Member for York (Mr. Gregory). He has the good fortune to represent one of England's most beautiful cities. He comes to the House with a distinguished record of activities on councils in Norwich and Norfolk. I am sure that that experience will stand him in good stead. The hon. Gentleman is also described as being a master of wine. I am sure he will agree that the vintage year of 1983 will grow and mature with keeping. I have a vested interest as I had the privilege to join the House of Commons at the same time as the hon. Gentleman. His speech dished up a strong brew. I wonder whether it was too strong for the palate of the Minister. He posed some questions to which I look forward to hearing the Minister's answers.
I welcome the debate as we are dealing with an important subject, much canvassed at the election. The House should maintain close scrutiny and control over the


impact of the economy on the living standards of households whose only income comes from the national insurance retirement pension.
I think that we obscure some of the problems confronting us by using strident party political dogma. We must be more objective in our approach to these matters. I accept that on some issues there is a case for the normal cut and thrust of parliamentary politics, but on this important subject we would be wise to try to secure some constraint.
When I first saw the motion before the House, I was afraid that the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) would restrict the terms of the debate to a narrow economic, statistical and financial analysis. I am pleased that he broadened the debate to include some of the wider issues facing pensioners.
Although income is the crucial problem facing pensioners, they have urgent needs for accommodation. They should have privacy and the facility to look after their material possessions and the freedom to express and indulge themselves in their last years of life. It is also important to provide them with sensible access to transport, so that they can provide for their own needs and indulge their own inclinations. They need security. We must ensure that they are not subjected to threats, or to the danger of physical violence. We must also see that they are not threatened by having essential domestic supplies cut off, just when they are in a most vulnerable position. They also need a great deal of domiciliary help to give them as much independence as possible as they become increasingly infirm and disabled.
I shall divide my remarks into two sections. First, I should like to consider some of the long-term aspects of the problem. The Secretary of State rightly said that, although there had been an increase of about one third in the number of those falling into the pension bracket in the past 20 years, the figure would stabilise to some extent in the medium term. However, after that there will be a real problem. According to some statistics I have turned up, by the year 2001 the number of people over the age of 75 will have increased by about 500,000, and the number of those over 85 by some 300,000.
We should make urgent long-term plans so that we can meet the consequences of that demographic change. Such an aged population needs special help, because the elderly are often unable to bathe themselves, are bedridden or are unable to leave their own homes. Indeed, some live on their own. Such problems demand urgent long-term planning. However, no one seems to be doing any sensible long-term planning. The only exception to that might be the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but the long-term plans that he has in mind do not augur well for the needs of the retired population.
I should like a reassurance from the Government about their intentions towards the development of the earnings-related pension scheme. I listened carefully to what the Secretary of State said about the proposed review, and look forward to seeing the Green Paper. However, in the course of that review I should like him to consider recommendations 10 and 11 of the Social Security Advisory Committee, which were published recently in its second report. The report said:
Retirement pensions should be maintained in real terms and there should be a periodical adjustment of basic pension levels in relation to earnings if the full objectives of the new pension scheme are to be achieved.

The Government Actuary's quinquennial review of the national insurance fund also made it plain that some uprating of benefits above the minimum price relation provided for was essential if the Government's intention to allow pensioners to share in the increased standards of living of the country as a whole were to be fulfilled. The problem is whether the Government are prepared in the long term to relate the increase in pensions not to the increase in prices, but to the increase in average earrings.
I should also like the Government's reaction to recommendation 11, which states:
Pension measures should be considered to give help to older and poorer pensioners who have not been able on grounds of age to take due advantage of the earnings-related element of the pension scheme.
The Social Services Committee took the view that there were special problems for those who had not had the opportunity, on the ground of age, to take advantage of the earnings-related element of the scheme. It said:
future Governments of whatever political complexion will have no choice but to regard this as one of the first calls on any additional resources.
Those points are important to long-term planning, and the Government should take them into account in their review.
There is a flaw in the basis that is used for calculating the retail price index for pensions. The RPI does not reflect the lifestyles, incomes or needs of pensioners. Indeed, they are excluded from the expenditure weighting calculation in the general index of retail prices. The general index shows a clear bias in favour of those at the top end of the distribution curve. There is evidence front Age Concern that since 1974 the cost of living for pensioner households has been 12 percentage points higher than the RPI. That is an important point that the Government should bear in mind when considering the relationship of pensions to prices.
In the short term, too, there are some problems to be confronted. Inadvertently, or otherwise, the Cabinet has recently inflicted a series of financial blows on pensioners. The new financial limits for the electricity and gas industries must have a cruel effect on pensioners. Indeed, I understand the concern expressed earlier by other hon. Members, because there is no doubt that hypothermia will be stalking the countryside again this year. In addition, the recently announced cuts in housing benefit will seriously affect pensioners. The scheme is now so complicated that it is difficult to assess its full impact.

Mr. Simon Hughes: Earlier, we heard suggestions that the problems of housing benefit had gone away. However, I hope that the Government will accept, and that my hon. Friend will confirm, that pensioners who are receiving only £30 per week are still receiving bills from their local authorities that show that there is a muddle in housing benefit. They used to have at least a bit of spare cash that they could use to budget properly. However, that has now gone under the housing benefit scheme. It confuses and worries hundreds of pensioners even now. Britain has a lower basic rate of pension than any other state in western Europe. Therefore, I hope that the Government will treat that problem as a matter of urgency.

Mr. Kirkwood: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that clarification. We all have examples in our constituencies of how the changes have caused concern in pensioner households throughout the country. The historic uprating cuts this week have not in any way compensated


pensioners fairly for the recent rise in prices. The sooner the Government consider twice-yearly upratings, the better for those who receive those benefits.
The cuts in the housing allocations will inevitably mean that local authorities will be unable to build many sheltered units and that the housing associations will no longer be able to continue the sterling work that they have been doing in providing suitable accommodation for retired people. The expenditure of local authorities is under severe constraint. My own local council is now having to choose between home helps and shoring up bridges that are in danger of falling down. That is a ridiculous position to be in, and the Government cannot deny that the situation has worsened as a direct result of their economic policies.
Furthermore, there is no prospect of any improvement in the Christmas bonus, the abolition of the earnings rule, the death grant, the flexible age of retirement or the standing charges, to which the hon. Member for York rightly referred.

Mr. William McKelvey: The hon. Gentleman's apprehension about benefit increases is correct. Is he aware that from January next year all pensions of less than £1 will be paid annually, one year in arrears? Many of my constituents will be affected by that. One old lady told me that she draws her pension of 89p every 10 weeks and regards it as a substantial part of her electricity bill. She is now to be denied that and will have to wait a year—I hope that she survives the year—to be paid in arrears. When I asked the South of Scotland Electricity Board whether it would wait one year for its bill to be paid, it understandably said that that was not possible.

Mr. Kirkwood: I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's intervention. I entirely agree that the Government do not understand the full horror of the system that they have introduced. It is only when examples such as the hon. Gentleman gave come to hand that the system's complexity is exposed.
In the long term, the Government must consider returning to a system that links pensions to prices or earnings, whichever is the greater. That is important as it is the only way in which we can protect the living standards of the poor and the elderly.
The Liberal party expounded at great length during the general election campaign on the rationalisation that it considers necessary to bring together the taxation and benefit schemes. That reform would eradicate many existing anomalies and provide the machinery for a real redistribution of resources to meet the needs of retired people. We shall follow the hon. Member for Oldham, West into the Division Lobby tonight.

Mr. Charles Morrison: I should like to be the first Conservative Member to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for York (Mr. Gregory) on his interesting and very well informed maiden speech. The whole House will have been pleased to hear the credit that he gave to his predecessor. Some of us have been here long enough to remember his predecessor's predecessor. It is extremely pleasant to recall the work of Charles Longbottom and to see another Conservative Member representing the York constituency.
My hon. Friend's speech was not entirely uncontroversial. His message to the Government was that they are doing quite well but could do better. I hope that it is not presumptuous of me to say that that is an entirely proper attitude for a new Government Back Bencher. It was a balanced stance which was neither sycophantic nor rebellious, and it was constructive. Many of us will echo many of the sentiments that my hon. Friend expressed. We all hope that he has as long and successful a reign as the Member for York as will York's new archbishop who was recently enthroned.
If emotion and rhetoric had any effect on the level of pensions, the speech made by the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) would have contributed to them considerably. His speech contrasted unfortunately with the calm, informative, factual and forthright speech of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, who reflected wisely on many aspects of the matter to which we shall have to give our attention.
Governments do not often look as far into the future as has my right hon. Friend. It is entirely right that he should do that. By the time that he finished his speech, I could not help feeling that it was hard of the Leader of the Opposition to have appointed the hon. Member for Oldham, West as the Opposition's spokesman on pensions as he cannot avoid responsibility for some of the less successful administration of pensions during the period of office of the previous Labour Government. What the hon. Member for Oldham, West said was repeated by several Opposition Members. They said that the Government are not doing enough for pensioners. No Government will be judged by the House to be doing enough for pensioners. I was glad that the hon. Member for Oldham, West acknowledged that all of us are trying to do much more.
It is regrettable that the arguments which are advanced in support of improvement are based almost entirely on hard cases. All hon. Members have regrettable and sad cases of people who draw attention to their plight at our surgeries. Nevertheless, it is not possible to improve, administer or legislate for pension schemes or systems purely on the basis of hard cases.
It is important to keep a perspective on pensions. There is not a pensioner in my constituency whom I would not like to have a larger pension. The same could be said of Opposition Members and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and his team. As I said, however, we must maintain a perspective. The Government increased the single person's pension from £ 19·50 to £34·05 between November 1978 and November 1983 and they increased the married couples' pension from £31·20 to £54·50 in the same period. That is an excellent record.
When one considers that prices have increased faster than that during the same period, the Government's record is seen to be even more remarkable, especially during a recession. Moreover, it should be pointed out that pensions have risen faster than the pensioners' price indices. I understand that, from the last quarter of 1978 to the third quarter of 1983—the latest date for which figures are available—the pensioners' price indices did not rise as fast as the retail price index. The single person pensioner price index rose by 62·7 per cent. from 1978 to the third quarter of 1983 and the married couple pensioner price index rose by 62·4 per cent. during the same period. The RPI rose by 67·7 per cent. during the same period. That shows that pensioners have done just a little better


than price increases alone demand. That is something to be welcomed, and on which the Government should be congratulated.
My hon. Friend the Member for York referred to inflation. It is undoubtedly true that the control of inflation is not only a feather in the cap of the Government, but above all has had a beneficial effect for those on low incomes, particularly pensioners. I am glad that so much emphasis has been laid on the control of inflation. One point has not been made this afternoon about the Christmas bonus. Reference has been made to it, but it should not be forgotten that it was originally instigated by the Conservative Government. The Conservative party can claim not only that it has been able to pay the Christmas bonus on every occasion that it has been in power, but that it instigated this particular form of help to pensioners, which is so welcome at Christmas time.

Mr. Simon Hughes: Having explained the Government's success, can the hon. Gentleman explain why so many pensioners, like so many other people in our constituencies, certainly in my constituency in the inner city, must have supplementary income from the state to top up the basic pension to give them enough to survive? Where is the success if over 2 million pensioners are still on the poverty line?

Mr. Morrison: I do not think that the hon. Gentleman was listening to my earlier remarks. I suggested that it was wise to maintain a sense of perspective. Undoubtedly we all want to see more and better provisions, but we have to take account of wider considerations. I am not claiming that the Government's record is perfect. My right hon. Friend knows that I am not, and he would be amazed if I were to say so. I shall not do so, but the record has been pretty good, given the circumstances and the times in which we have been living.
A briefing recently arrived on my desk from the Child Poverty Action Group was not entirely complimentary to the Government in every respect; it was quite critical. However, at least in regard to pensions, it made the point—this is related to what the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Southwark (Mr. Hughes) has just said—that the number of people over pension age who are living below the supplementary benefit level fell by 15 per cent. between 1979 and 1981. That is a considerable improvement. I do not know the latest figures, but that demonstrates yet again the successes of Government policy for pensioners.
The second part of the Opposition motion
calls upon Her Majesty's Government to reverse its damaging and increasingly discredited economic policies".
I should not agree for one moment with that request, or with the rest of the motion, although I am one of those who consistently suggest that the Government should evolve their policies to take account of changing circumstances and to do as I should like and provide a little more stimulus to the economy without recreating inflation. That is possible.
It is wholly unwise to forget either now or in the long term the implications for public spending attached to pensions. In that regard, I was pleased to open my newspaper this morning and to read the speech by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to the Brent Conservatives last night. A good deal of what he said then he repeated today. In that speech, he referred to the long term. Quite rightly, he called for an appraisal of the

circumstances. He asked for a rational approach, and with that I entirely agree. If there is not a rational appraisal, no hon. Member can sensibly or reasonably draw conclusions and exercise choice, which is what we have to do, or, what the level of pension or any other form of public spending should rightly be.
My right hon. Friend was right to call for this rational appraisal. It seems clear that the necessity for such an appraisal for the long term is all the more necessary if I am right in concluding that there is some difference of opinion between the Department of Health and Social Security and the Treasury. One cannot believe everything written in the newspaper, but the journalists who came to that conclusion would not be far from my view on the subject.
Therefore, it is regrettable that there is no independent body or adjunct to the Government such as the Think Tank—call it what one will—to look objectively at such subjects and to put the facts before the Government. It may be that discussion of a think tank is not proper for this debate, but I express the hope—perhaps this will even be support for my right hon. Friend—that he will press for the re-establishment not of the think tank of the variety that was recently guillotined but a proper one that does what it was set up to do—to make long-term appraisals for the benefit of the Government and other political parties. The more open the resolutions of these appraisals, the better, so that all political parties may know the facts and develop and evolve their policies accordingly. All too often there is too much emotion in policy making and too little reference to the facts.
I congratulate the Government on what theyare doing, and I encourage my right hon. Friend to do even better.

Mr. George Foulkes: When I listen to speeches made by hon. Members such as the hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison), I wonder whether they understand what is meant by poverty in Britain today. I wonder whether they ever see the poverty that exists and that affects many pensioners. Perhaps the hon. Member for Devizes believes that a housing problem is deciding at which of his houses he will spend the weekend. Those are not the housing problems that our old-age pensioners face. They have problems with inadequate houses, with heating those inadequite houses and in some cases with getting decent houses.
On a less aggressive note, I concur with the remarks of the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood)—I was surprised that he seems to have abandoned the Liberal Whip, because his speech sounded like that of a non-party Member—and of the hon. Member for Devizes that the hon. Member for York (Mr. Gregory) made an excellent speech. I hope that he will not soon be disillusioned by the actions of the Government, whom, I am afraid, he will troop into the Lobby to support this evening.
I am pleased to speak today as the joint chairman of the all-party pensioners' group. I pay tribute to my predecessor Jock Stallard, now Lord Stallard of St. Pancras. As you know, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I do not favour the House of Lords, which I sometimes believe is one of the best day centres for the elderly that exists. However, if we must have a second Chamber, we can do no better than to fill it with people such as Lord Stallard.
My hon. Friends will find it difficult to believe, but as the joint chairman of the all-party pensioners' group I sometimes become disillusioned. The group produces early-day motions signed by many Conservative Members, including the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), now parliamentary private secretary to the Minister, but I suspect that they sign the motions only to send them to their elderly constituents as evidence of their support of the cause mentioned in the motion. It does not take much to sign an early-day motion, but when they are asked to vote on the subject of the motion—when they are asked for deeds, not words, to support the elderly—they troop into the Government Lobby.
My hon. Friends, who meet pensioners more often than do Conservative Members, and who understand their problems, know that the most important matter is the level of pensions. Pensioners have often said to me, "If only we had a decent pension we would not need concessions. We would not need cheap television licences or travel concessions if we had a decent pension." That is why the pensioners valued the system in which pensions were linked to prices or to earnings increases, whichever was the larger, because for the first time that ratchet effect gave them a real increase in pensions.
What worries me is that the Government say that keeping up with inflation is enough. We are in danger of accepting that. As the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) said, 2 million pensioners need supplementary benefits to make up their basic pensions. We have lowered the expectations of the House, of pensioners, and of pensioners' organisations. Keeping up with inflation is not enough if one starts from a low base, which is why the ratchet effect was one of the greatest advantages that pensioners enjoyed. I see the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton)—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where?"] It is the hon. Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow). I always make that mistake.

Mr. Tony Marlow: I am extremely flattered by the hon. Gentleman's mistake. My right hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton) is far better looking than I am.

Mr. Foulkes: I am grateful for that intervention. What a pity that the hon. Member for Macclesfield is not here, because in March he rightly criticised the Government for their willingness to introduce the clawback. He said that the change in the method of calculation from the predictive to the historic was a device to obtain the clawback by another means. He was right.
I heard the Secretary of State speaking on the "Today" programme this morning from a radio car. It is appropriate that the right hon. Gentleman always gives interviews from his getaway car, because he is frightened that the pensioners will come round to find him. He said that my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) was booed by pensioners about 10 years ago, but the right hon. Gentleman is frightened to meet pensioners nowadays. He would be lynched, and not simply have a can of red paint thrown at him. The pensioners know—the Chancellor effectively admitted it when I asked him the other day—that the change in the basis for calculation caused a real clawback of pensions.
Hon. Members mentioned the twice-yearly uprating of pensions, which in the past was supported by many Conservative Members. They include the hon. Member for Oxford, West and Abingdon (Mr. Patten), who is now a Minister, the hon. Member for Watford (Mr. Garel-Jones), who is now a Whip, and the hon. Member for Calder Valley (Mr. Thompson), who is also a Whip. When the Secretary of State was the Opposition spokesman on social security matters, he attacked the Labour Minister and said:
Why does the right hon. Lady still resist six-monthly reviews of pensions, for which we have pressed? Is it really only because the proposal comes from the Opposition side?"—[Official Report, 22 May 1975; Vol. 892, c. 1626.]
Now he is Secretary of State and can do something about it, so why does he resist the proposal? Is it only because it comes from the Opposition?

Mr. Fowler: If the hon. Gentleman had read the remainder of the quotation, he would have seen that I qualified that remark by saying that it was a time of high inflation. The difference is that inflation was then running at 25 per cent. Now it is 5 per cent.

Mr. Foulkes: The pensioner, the pensioners' organisations and some Back-Bench Members still want such a change. Most of our partners in the European Community manage to have a twice-yearly increase, so why cannot Britain? Neither the Secretary of State nor other Ministers has answered that question.
The Minister for Social Security knows of my interest in the death grant, in which he too is interested. I share the concern, annoyance, disgust and despair expressed by many hon. Members on both sides of the House that have lingered on over this matter. There has been promise after promise. The previous Minister promised unequivocally, without reservation, an announcement by Christmas 1981. Then the Government produced a consultative document, to which they received more than 700 replies, most of which rejected the Government's option and put forward a more positive option for an all-round increase. At present the death grant of £30 does not even cover the cost of the two doctors' certificates required if a body is cremated. The VAT levied on services provided at funerals amounts to more than £30 in each case, so the Government are making a profit out of death. They claw back in VAT more than they give in the death grant.
As the hon. Member for York said, there was a petition with 1 million signatures, but the Prime Minister refused to accept it. I wrote to the Prime Minister asking her how she reconciled the vacillation of her Ministers, who are unable to make a decision about the death grant, and are transfixed like the rat in front of the snake—I hope that I am using the right metaphor—with the resolute approach of which we hear so much? The Prime Minister wrote me a pathetic letter, saying that the resources were not available. There are unlimited resources for an airport in the Falklands, and for Fortress Falklands, but there are not enough resources for an increase in the death grant.
Let me give another example of how Conservative Members, including the parliamentary private secretary of the Minister for Social Security, the hon. Member for Rugby and Kenilworth (Mr. Pawsey), behave. It concerns the Christmas bonus. The Secretary of State made announcements about occupational pensions. Conservative Members always seem to be interested in them. They talk very little about the ordinary pensioners.
They avoid that subject. I gave the Secretary of State the opportunity to make an announcement about the Christmas bonus. He berated my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West about the Christmas bonus. It is still only £10, when it should be £38, to keep up with inflation. We waited, but we got nothing. The right hon. Gentleman made no announcement.
I shall finish with two points. The first concerns Europe. I find it strange that this Government are keen to carry out some of the decisions of the European Court, some of the directives of the European Commission, and some of the suggestions that come from the European Community. The UHT milk is now flooding in, threatening our doorstep deliveries of milk. We implement directives about the size of eggs. We have directives about the specific gravity of beer. However, when it comes to harmonising the amount of pension for retired people we get no action. In Belgium, a single person gets 60 per cent. of gross average earnings, in France the figure is 50 per cent., in the Netherlands it is 42 per cent., but in Britain it is only 24 per cent. Surely, it is time that we brought it up to the level of our European partners.
My final point, which I am sure hon. Members will be pleased to hear, is that in my capacity as joint chairman of the all-party pensioners' group I was asked to speak a few weeks ago to a meeting in Finchley, the Prime Minister's constituency. It was a little like going into the lion's den. I did not know what kind of a reception I would receive from the 300 pensioners who turned up. However, I did not receive a hostile reception, and I was astonished by the strength of criticism that they voiced about the Government. They criticised the amount of the pension. They criticised the NHS cuts. I am not one to advocate the closure of any hospital, but I was told by those pensioners about the threatened closure of the Finchley memorial hospital. I was told that the Prime Minister had said that it would be closed over her dead body. It is a tempting proposition to say that if any hospital is to close it should be the Finchley memorial hospital, as long as the Prime Minister keeps her promise.
The pensioners at that meeting in Finchley were overwhelmingly in favour of the retention of the Greater London council. They supported Ken Livingstone rather than the Prime Minister because they valued the concessionary ticket, the free travel. I realise that Conservative Members will say, "Ah, but we have clear assurances from the London Boroughs Association that after the GLC goes it will continue that scheme." I am a Scotsman, and I do not throw away money lightly, but I bet the Prime Minister a pound to a penny that that guarantee will not last long. As soon as the London boroughs take over, particularly the London borough of Barnet, which includes the Prime Minister's constituency, we shall see the end of the concessionary fares, the free travel for pensioners. The pensioners know that.
When I visited Finchley I got the feeling that if there were a general election tomorrow the pensioners there would sweep the Prime Minister out. I am not in favour of early retirement for all, but that is the one early retirement that I would look forward to, as would British pensioners, with the greatest glee.

Mr. Patrick Nicholls: I start by saying how much I appreciated the speech of my hon. Friend the

Member for York (Mr. Gregory). It was an elegant and eloquent speech, and I certainly look forward to hearing from him again in future.
There was one aspect that I thought I should like about this debate—and I have not yet been disappointed. Although we debate many contentious subjects on which not all hon. Members could agree, this debate is about a subject on which there should be considerable agreement. Surely one of the few matters that would unite hon. Members on both sides of the House is the care of those who cannot look after themselves. Who is more worthy of our care and compassion than the elderly and retired? That sentiment has no party political element. As a Conservative, I feel that way, and I am sure that many Opposition Members feel the same. No political party can have a monopoly on compassion. It is not good enough to say, "We care." We have to do something about it.
We should pause to consider how many elderly people there are. I shall give the figures for today, not for the future. There are about 9 million people in this country of pensionable age. That represents about 18 per cent. of the population of the country as a whole. Certainly in Teignbridge the percentage is far higher—about 26·6 per cent. I claim no special experience when I say that from what I learnt during the election campaign and what I know from my constituency and my postbag pensioners feel bitterly about the deals that they have had from past Governments.
The Opposition motion seemed almost to say that there have been cuts in the pension. We have had many statistics today, so I shall not give many more, but we should remember that this Government have not cut pensions. During the lifetime of the previous Conservative Government, pensions kept pace with prices. Pensions went up about 74·6 per cent., and in the same period prices went up by 69·9 per cent. I do not say that a single person on an old-age pension of £34·05 can have a ball. That is certainly not true. No hon. Member would say that was a marvellous sum and that the pensioner should be grateful. In fact, it is the bare minimum. Few hon. Members would care to live on that amount. However, it has at least kept pace with inflation. That is an important and significant fact, because hon. Members continue to say that the pension is not high enough, that there is no point in. talking about inflation, and that not everyone has a pool of capital, but neither does the country.
Inflation is important because many pensioners do have a small amount of money tucked away. It may be a few coppers put away week by week to contribute to the death grant. People who do that have a small amount of capital. If they have to suffer inflation at 25 per cent., it is no consolation to know that at the end of the year their pensions will be increased in line with inflation. During the period 1974 to 1979, pensioners would have seen their nest-eggs halved. That fact is relevant when talking about inflation. If inflation is increasing at 25 per cent., by the week before the next yearly increase there will be a great deal less left in one's pocket to do the basic food shopping. The pensioner is not consoled, when going to the corner shop and being faced with those prices, by the fact that the Government will give him or her a 25 per cent. increase at the end of the day.
Inflation is also important when talking about pension increases keeping in line with inflation.

Mr. McKelvey: Is the hon. Gentleman bearing in mind that the pension increase on Monday was 3·7 per cent., while inflation was 5 per cent.? Irrespective of the nest-eggs that pensioners might have, they are concerned that the pension increase buys less than it should. They are being deprived, irrespective of their nest-eggs.

Mr. Nicholls: I understand the hon. Gentleman's anxiety, and I shall address myself to that problem in a few moments.
The Government try to look after pensioners and ensure that they receive a proper pension increase, but money has to come from somewhere. There is not a limitless amount of money available.
It is all very well for the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) to indulge in great flights of rhetoric and talk about the record of the previous Labour Government. I hope I can speak in a non-partisan way. For once I am not trying to score points in anything I say about the previous Labour Government. When they were in office—and their compassion cannot be questioned—they were charged with responsibilities that the hon. Member for Oldham, West does not have today. When considering the reponsibilities of office in the context of his caring and compassionate speech, he might care to bear in mind the appalling pickle that that Labour Government got themselves into when they found themselves hooked on the earnings as opposed to the prices link. Hon. Members on both sides of the House will remember the Labour Government's contortions when trying to honour that commitment. When talking about that I can do no better than mention a remark by the then Labour Secretary of State for Social Services. When tackled about the 1978 pensions deficiency, he replied:
There is a statutory obligation to take these figures (i.e. earnings) into account, which was done, but no statutory obligation to get it right.
One could make a cheap remark about that and say that it showed the right hon. Gentleman's cynicism. It did not. It showed his desperation, because he did not have the money to honour the commitment.
The Christmas bonus excites a certain amount of merriment and mirth on the Oppostion Benches. I cannot see why it should. When I said that for two years the Labour Government did not pay the Christmas bonus, I was not saying it in a partisan way. They must have been appalled when in Cabinet they had to consider taking bonuses away from pensioners, for two reasons. In political terms it must have been a difficult decision, but in compassionate terms it must have been appalling to be so strapped for cash that a caring Government had to cut Christmas bonuses for two years in succession. That is the significance. It was not, for once, the wicked old Labour Government doing these beastly things. It was a measure of their dilemma. They had the care and compassion and wanted to do what was morally and decently right, but at the end of the day, when using their calculators, matches or the back of an envelope, the cash was not there. My point is that we do no service to pensioners by forgetting that their pension increase has to be found from somewhere.
The hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes) said that if there is money to spend on Fortress Falklands and the Falklands airfield, more should be spent on the old-age pension.

Mr. Foulkes: Hear, hear.

Mr. Nicholls: I hear the hon. Gentleman say, "Hear, hear." If roles were reversed and the Labour party were in government, I wonder whether he would take that attitude. The Government must honour a wide range of responsibilities. On this issue they will be judged on whether they have done the right thing. One cannot say that money should be taken from one thing and given to another.
I was questioned about the fact that pensioners lose because of the change from the forecast to the historic method of calculation. One must remember how that came about in the first place. It was calculated on the historic basis until 1976. I sympathise with the Labour Government's dilemma, but they could not find the money. One could say that that was the inevitable consequence of their economic policies, but that is a point for another day. They could not find the cash, so they switched to the forecasting method. Nothing could be more unsatisfactory for a Government than to have to make predictions in that way in an inflationary age. We know what happened. On about seven out of nine occasions the calculation was wrong and the wrong increase—even allowing for the assumptions on which it was based—was given.
We now have a logical and certain method. It works on a historic basis—on what has happened rather than on what might happen. The point made by the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Mr. McKelvey) was fair, but ironic. The Government have brought inflation down. If inflation were constantly coming down, the historic method would not have brought about the apparent injustice that the hon. Gentleman had in mind. The change happened to coincide with a slight increase in inflation. Inflation is now coming down and the position should be remedied. There can be no doubt, even on a straightforward arithmetical basis, that what pensioners lose one year, they will gain in the next. I know it is said, "That is not good enough. Some of them will not be here. If you are approaching subsistence level, you need the money now, not later." That is a marvellous argument for those who are not charged with the responsibility of getting it right. There are only two ways to calculate the pension increase—by forecasting or on an historic basis. At least, on an historic basis, it comes right within 24 months, and that must be important. That does not mean that the garden is entirely rosy and that no improvement could be made.
There is one improvement that might be worth considering. It relates to those who decide to opt for a higher rate of supplementary benefit with a view to coming off the unemployment register—effectively those who retire at 60. They suffer an injustice because, if they want to earn to supplement their "new retirement money", they are tied to the levels of earnings appertaining to supplementary benefit. I know from a written answer that I have recently received that the Minister makes the point that supplementary benefit is one thing and old-age pensions another. Many people who are approaching retirement age feel badly about that, and that matter could perhaps be looked at again.
People will be looking to the House today not for rhetoric and arm-waving, but for the knowledge that hon. Members on both sides of the House take seriously the plight of pensioners. They can be told that the Government have a good solid record. The Government are protecting them as much as they possibly can while at the same time


not spending money out of compassion, which, at the end of the day, pushes inflation through the roof. The most cruel thing of all for pensioners, after they have listened to our deliberations today and the bombast and rhetoric of the hon. Member for Oldham, West, is to think that the money is there waiting for them, if only rhetoric could produce the money. If they go away thinking that, if they go away not realising what a good record the Government have, their expectations will have been cruelly raised. Regardless of party politics, no hon. Member should raise expectations which will be dashed. The Government have a good record on pensions, and pensioners should know that as well.

Mr. Ernie Roberts: Unlike the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls), who has been engaged in and has referred to rhetoric and theories about pensioners and their problems, I shall speak from experience.
Two years before coming to the House I was already retired on a pension and in receipt of a small addition from my previous employer. It was no life of luxury. Pensioners are much worse off than I was during that period. I have a much higher standard of living now than I had then or even when I worked for my living as an engineer.
I want to speak about reality, not about statistics. We have had a good deal of wishful thinking from Conservative Members. I wish to talk about the reality of life for pensioners in Hackney, North and Stoke Newington. The living standard of old-age pensioners in my area is outrageous and scandalous. They live in poverty and many die neglected and alone when they need not. They live in constant fear. I have before me a cartoon sent to me for this debate by an old-age pensioner. The cartoon was drawn by a Mr. Fowler. It must be a different Mr. Fowler. The cartoon shows the Prime Minister acting as a conductor on a bus of old-age pensioners. The Prime Minister is shown tearing up the pensioners' GLC free travel permit. On her money bag is written "Feed the rich". That is the opinion of an old-age pensioner who took the trouble to write to me and send that cartoon.
Old-age pensioners come to my advice surgery every Sunday to complain about their gas or electricity supply being disconnected by the board. They live in damp squalid homes that need repair and modernisation. Many are imprisoned in tower blocks such as those on the Nightingale estate or those that were described in the House a few days ago by my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney, South and Shoreditch (Mr. Sedgemore). The Government must make money available to Hackney borough council to deal with these problems.
There are not enough home helps or social services workers in the area to help the high proportion of old-age pensioners. There is a great need for free telephones for old-age pensioners—for some it is the only lifeline. In a local paper that is produced and distributed to residents the point is made that
around 1,300 specially-installed telephones could be among the aids for elderly and housebound people which will have to be cut off if the council is starved of more cash by the Government"—
in other words, if the Government operate penalties against councils such as Hackney.
Health care in the area has deteriorated disastrously since the Tory party came to power in 1979. Hospitals

have closed. Many of the doctors in the area are old. They work alone in dingy surgeries, in old shop units and in first floor rooms of houses that have been left empty. The old-age pensioners who come to see the doctor queue in the streets in the cold and rain. Those are the conditions from which old-age pensioners suffer in places such as Hackney. Rhetoric and fine words from Conservative Members will not solve the problem. The only way to solve the problem is to put money into places such as Hackney.
Arising from this poverty and neglect Hackney borough has the second highest discharge rate from hospitals for schizophrenia—20 in every 10,000, which is almost twice the national average. Old people are being driven into insanity. It is no exaggeration to say that when they come to see me week after week at the surgery I see a mental deterioration.—[Laughter.] Conservative Members should not laugh because they do not see it

Mr. Skinner: It lines their pockets.

Mr. Roberts: That is right—it lines their pockets. These old people are being driven into the lunatic asylum as a result of the living conditions being imposed on them by the Tory Government.
As with many pensioners, I have worked for 50 years. Pensioners have produced more wealth in their lifetimes than they could ever consume, yet they eke out their existence in poverty. Is that right? Where is the morality in that? That is the morality of the system of society which the Tory Government represent and defend. The Government say "Let these poor people who have worked for 50 years save out of their miserable salaries." The Low Pay Unit has just produced a booklet for Hackney entitled "Low Pay and Unemployment in a London Borough." How can these people save? They live in poverty even when they are working because of the exploitation of those who employ them. This is no laughing matter. Poverty is a serious problem and it can be solved only if more money is poured into efforts to solve it.
I have before me the Queen's Speech which outlined the Tory Government's policy. Old-age pensioners did not even merit a mention in it. That shows what the Tory party thinks about the old-age pensioners. The Government owe old-age pensioners a decent, secure and happy life. For the benefit of the hon. Member for Teignbridge who asked from where was the money to come and who said that money was needed for many different things, may I say that the Prime Minister has £130 billion in her purse. The right hon. Lady is always talking about the family budget. Her family budget for this country is £130 billion I can give the House examples of where money is being misspent. For instance, £16 billion is spent on unemployment. There is £16 billion spent on arms expenditure—to defend what type of life? The type of life from which old-age pensioners are suffering" That money should be injected into Hackney to solve these serious problems. The Government have the money and responsibility to ensure that the problems of old-age pensioners throughout Britain are solved.

Mr. Tony Marlow: I find the motion depressing. As I have strong views about the things that I stand for, so I am sure that there are members of the Labour party who have equally strong beliefs in what they


stand for. But the motion is destructive of the credibility of the Labour party and can only do it damage. If the Labour party is damaged, the alliance benefits, and I wish Labour more success than the alliance.
The motion is naked propaganda. It is designed to be plastered all over the front cover of Labour Weekly. It represents bleeding hearts poured out all over the Order Paper. It requires more money, but nowhere does the motion say from where it should come.

Mr. Skinner: I will tell the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Marlow: We look forward to hearing from the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner). We are always delighted to see him and we are particularly delighted tonight to see that he has his son with him.

Mr. Skinner: My son?

Mr. Marlow: I will explain to the hon. Gentleman later.
I say that this depressing motion is destructive of Labour Members' credibility because everybody knows that many of those we see on the Opposition Benches were present in 1975 and 1976 when the pensioners were prevented from having their Christmas bonus. They were led by Lady Castle who, in 1976, at a stroke, reduced the value of the pension by 6 per cent. That financial sleight of hand has since cost pensioners millions of pounds a year. Yet the Opposition have the cheek to criticise this Government, whose record on pensions is second to none.
Most of us have elderly relatives and we all have elderly constituents. We appreciate the problems of the aged, and I assure Opposition Members that my hon. Friends care every bit as much as they do. Not only do we care, but, as was eloquently said by my hon. Friend the Member for York (Mr. Gregory), we have done something about it. My hon. Friend gave a catalogue of the many services that we have improved or provided for the elderly. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend's predecessor, the then Labour Member for York, who was a valued Member of the House. I had much time for him, and I hope that he is doing well in his present occupation.
Some things in life are certain. We all grow old and finally die. Most of us will become pensioners, so we have a vested interest in seeing that the pension is as realistic as we can afford to make it.
There are other facts. For example, since the Conservatives came to office, the real value of pensions has increased by 5·5 per cent. Not only against the retail price index but against the pensions price index, pensions have gone up faster than ever. The heating addition has gone up in real terms by 60 per cent. That is real caring, real money and real value.

Mr. Simon Hughes: The hon. Gentleman says that he has compassion. How can he reconcile that compassion with saying that pensioners are entitled to only £34 a week on which to live? Does that standard justify the compassion that he is leading the House to believe he has? I do not believe that it is compatible; nor do I believe does he.

Mr. Marlow: Few people would say that the pension is generous or that they would not wish it to be higher. I

simply say that the Conservatives have provided a more generous and realistic pension than any previous Government.

Mr. Hughes: If pensioners do not have enough to live on, it is no use.

Mr. Marlow: The pensions paid to this generation of pensioners must be borne by those in work—the younger generation. They feel no resentment. The younger generation would wish to have a generous and compassionate pension scheme. We must take account of the fact that since the Conservative Government have been in power there are about 600,000 more pensioners than there were before and that means that more resources are needed than were needed when the Labour Government were in power.
The hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes)—the Paul Daniels of economic policy—is good at discovering what needs to be done and, no doubt, producing money from thin air. The Government are a little more responsible and do not gull people in that way. The support of those of pension age takes in excess of £9,000 million a year from the resources of the Exchequer, taxpayers' money or contributions—whichever way it is put. Said quickly, that is a figure taken from thin air. However, £9,000 million a year is actually £16 a week from each person in work. [HoN. MEMBERS: "Half the arms programme".] We heard interventions like that before. We had a general election a few months ago. The Labour Party, on the basis of its defence policy, suffered a humiliating reverse. People as a whole are 100 per cent. behind the Government's arms programme.
I know that my plea will not be met. There is such a lack of understanding of the facts of life and arithmetic incompetence in the House that it would be almost sensible to insist that anyone who stood for Parliament should have not A-level but perhaps O-level maths. I know that that would be too much for the right hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock), because I do not believe that he could manage even that level. It is a fact of life that if we are to spend money, we must get it from somewhere. It is no good having ideas about what the money will be spent on or how the resources will be committed unless and until we find out from where those resources will come.
Another way of looking at the contribution that society makes, quite rightly and properly, to the elderly is that for every family of four it costs £1,500 a year. That is a lot of money. We must think about that before we decide from where any more money will come. I am not saying that that is wrong or that we should reduce the amount. At the moment, we are having discussions about the family. We should keep the level of resources for our elderly at least at the same level, but many societies—even some that have recently come within our midst, the immigrant societies—are much better at looking after elderly people. They have a greater commitment to their family members as they grow older. If the Government, through the fiscal system, encouraged people to look after families better, that would be great social progress.
What else have the Government done since they have been in power? During the past 10 years, 200,000 more people than before have been working in the hospital service. That is a valuable service to the elderly. We have reorganised the Health Service. We have taken out a whole layer of administration so that resources can be spent on


the needs of our people, especially the elderly. Recently we produced the Griffiths report, which gives us a chance to have the Health Service properly managed at last.
The Government have increased the size of the police force. The hon. Member for Hackney, North and Stoke Newington (Mr. Roberts) talked about elderly people living in fear. If there were a change of Government and the Labour party were in power, police numbers would be reduced to their previous levels, road blocks would be put in the way of their activities and they would become so ineffective that elderly people would live in fear, trepidation and trembling all their lives.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Ernest Armstrong): Order. I remind the House that the Front Bench spokesmen hope to catch my eye by 9.10 pm. The debate is about the purchasing power of the old-age pension. I hope that the hon. Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) will return to that.

Mr. Marlow: Inflation is one of the most important factors for pensioners. They need stability in the cost of living. Most people want to save for their old age, to help themselves and to look after themselves. In five years of Labour Government, the savings that people had put aside to look after themselves were cruelly halved in value. That is theft, robbery and deception. Conservatives are committed to ensuring that inflation remains extremely low so that people can save for their old age, look after themselves and retain their pride and dignity.
Pensions this year are very important and we must be as generous as we can, but pensions next year and in succeeding years are also important. The only way to be honest and to do the best for our people is to ensure that the economy of this country is properly run and that business does not at this stage have to pay taxes that will destroy its future. We must ensure that business can invest so that we can increase the wealth of the country and the community and thus have more resources to devote, rightly, to our elderly people.
Labour Members have been howling and complaining, putting forward plans for more expenditure and telling the Government how to cut their expenditure, but they have not said a word about the cost to the public sector or how the public sector can become more efficient and thus release resources. The Government must come to grips with the problem of the public sector and provide resources not only for industry to create more wealth, but to produce more money, more value, more resources and better pensions for our people.

Mr. Kevin Barron: I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling the hon. Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) to order and saying that he should stick to matters affecting the plight of pensioners.
The 3·7 per cent. increase in pensions this week is a tragedy for the House. I was told about that in June. A short time later, we had a long debate about Members' salaries in which we decided to give ourselves a rise in July, followed by further increases every January for the next three years, every one of them well over 3·7 per cent. and taking no account of inflation. The decision to give pensioners 3·7 per cent. is a disgrace. No Tory Member

today has tried to justify the pitifully low pensions of £34 for a single person and just over £54 for a married couple. That is certainly not a healthy pension.
Whatever else was increased by the Labour Government, one increase was achieved, although it was difficult and we had to find the money to pay for it We linked pensions with earnings, which is the fairest way to try to eradicate poverty. The Conservatives took away that link, costing the pensioners money that should now be in their pockets. My hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) gave the exact figures. I hope that the Minister will comment on them and on what has happened to old-age pensions since the Conservatives came to office.
We must also consider the effects of other Government policies on pensioners. Rotherham metropolitan borough council had an excellent housing record in the 1970s. Now we cannot afford to build houses for old people in the area. We used to concentrate our energies on building accommodation with wardens and flats or bungalows in which old people could live, but now we cannot make any starts that would help the aged population in Rother Valley. We must accept that there are more old people than ever before. The Government, by not giving local authorities the money to build houses, are attacking pensioners. Many people whom I have seen say that they would like to live in a bungalow because of illness, sickness or disability, but they have little chance of getting into such a house. The Government should consider that matter.
In south Yorkshire, we run an excellent and popular passenger transport service. If anyone does not believe that that service is for the community, especially old people, they could do no better than get on a bus in the Rotherham area at 9.30 am and see the old people travelling on the bus, going to visit relatives or going into town to shop, trying to spin out their pensions a little more. That service is under direct threat from the Government. We are attacking pensioners not just by giving them a rise that is lower than the rate of inflation but by threatening the services that they get.
Meals on wheels, luncheon clubs and home helps have gone to the wall in the past few years. Those services are directly connected with the care of old people. It is an utter disgrace that the local authorities have been forced to cut back on home helps, meals on wheels and luncheon clubs when the number of old-age pensioners is growing. We should expand those services, yet we must cut back because of Government dictates.
It may be true that old people often die from hypothermia. However, in view of the energy surplus, thousands of old people should not die each year. 'We cannot care for them all as individuals, but we could put the energy surplus to use to make sure that old people are kept warm in the winter. I am sorry that we are not thinking of doing that. The allowances are not sufficient.

Mr. McKelvey: It is not a free market.

Mr. Barron: Indeed, it is not a free market.
There are long queues of patients in the National Health Service. It means that there have to be priorities in health care. Who is at the back of the queue for kidney transplants, hip replacements and knee replacements? It is not those of 40 or 50 years of age but those of 60, 70 or


80 years of age. They do not have priority for treatment because of their age. Indeed, they are discriminated against because of their age.
The list of problems is endless. We shall not be able to means-test our pensioners for ever. We should move away from means-tested benefits for pensioners. At present 2 million pensioners receive supplementary benefit. That is an indictment of this country. We are supposed to be civilised. We should make sure that there are good basic state pensions for old-age pensioners. If one is wondering where to look for finance, one need look no further than Trident. Some £10 billion will be spent on weapons of death and destruction. It is immoral that any Government should consider that when our pensioners are in such a plight.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: The hon. Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) talked about the Labour party tabling a motion for propaganda purposes. Let us face it, that cannot be the purpose. I was hoping that it would be the motion that was passed at the Labour party conference in the first week of October, but it missed out one or two things to which I shall refer later. It is nonsense to say it is blatant propaganda. I think that the machine has been at work. I know there was a lot of good will and unity at the Labour party conference but we must now fill in some of the blanks.
The hon. Gentleman talked, as many Conservative Members have done, about not being able to find the money to pay reasonable pensions. Who do they think they are kidding? Yesterday a debate was devoted to the stock exchange. It was about all this money coming through the stock exchange, what is called "liquid stuff'. It was all about ensuring that jobbers and brokers, who it was alleged were not doing as much work as one old-age pensioner, would get fantastic professional salaries or increments—

Mr. Dennis Canavan: Emoluments.

Mr. Skinner: That is the word I was looking for—so they could make money on the side, by inside share dealing and goodness knows what else. The 50 Members of Parliament who represent Lloyds here as underwriters joined in, too. There was plenty of money for that. The place was flooded in it—all spread across the carpet of the House that cost £24 a square yard. Yet the hon. Member for Northampton, North says that there is no money in the country. He spends most of his time talking about where the real wealth is, and all the time throughout the last four and a half years this Tory Government have been aided and abetted by the hon. Member for Northampton, North and all those who should be sitting on the Conservative Benches but have not turned up for the debate. It is significant that there are nearly twice as many Tory Members of Parliament as there are Labour Members of Parliament, yet not one could be found to speak in the later stages of the debate. That shows the paucity of the Government's efforts for the pensioners.
Therefore, I do not take much cognisance of the argument about there being no money. There is always plenty of money for the purposes that some of my hon. Friends referred to earlier.
My hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Mr. McKelvey) talked about Trident, which will now cost £10 billion or £12 billion. [Interruption.] I am told it is £20 billion, yet the Government say there is no money in the country. My hon. Friend the Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes)—he is a pro-Marketeer and not bad on pensions, as a matter of fact—talked about the Falklands—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I remind the hon. Gentleman that we are discussing pensioners.

Mr. Skinner: I am trying to give an answer, because we have had a debate of a kind. The only question that has been asked from the Conservative Benches, from the Secretary of State to the last Conservative Member who spoke, is from where a Labour Government would get the money, and it has to be answered.
My hon. Friend the Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley said that the Falklands dispute cost £3 billion, but the Government were sending money to the Argentines when there was still a junta. The Prime Minister was telling bankers to send money to Argentina to bail out their economy so that the Argentines could use some of it that ought to be going to the pensioners. The money was going to the Argentines so that they could buy more French Exocets and other armaments with which to bomb the airstrip that the British taxpayers are currently paying for. What lunacy! The Government then have the cheek to tell us that there is no money in the country. We do not believe it, and we will not have it.
We can justifiably be proud of the record of the last Labour Government. I know that they could have done better, I know that they should not have cancelled the Christmas bonus, but they will not fall into that trap again. We want no more instructions to the next Labour Government from the International Monetary Fund and whispers in the ear from the leader of the Liberal party. I remember those sad days. We shall not go down that path again.

Mr. Simon Hughes: You would not have survived without us.

Mr. Skinner: We should have tabled a motion stating that we would pay people decent pensions, build more houses, prop up the welfare state and reduce NHS waiting lists. We should have gone to the country on that basis, and we would not have needed the Liberals.
Last Thursday the Chancellor of the Exchequer made a statement that flies in the face of all that the Tories have said in this debate. He stood at the Dispatch Box and said, I have found a winning combination". I thought that he had come up on the pools. The Minister for Social Security should say how much of that winning combination will go to the old-age pensioners.
The Chancellor meant that he had found a winning combination for the stockbrokers and jobbers and the rest of his friends in the City. Year by year the Conservatives have shoved the balance of power away from working class people and pensioners towards the bosses. An article in the Daily Telegraph on 1 October reveals just how much the pensioners have been hammered. It said that Mr. Smith, a jobber, had got a 250 per cent. pay rise and that his turnaround profit was £100,000.
The Government say that they have no money, yet the big four banks have made profits of £6,000 million in the


Government's first four years of office. They are hound to make more because interest rates remain at 9, 10 or 11 per cent., despite the fact that inflation is less than 5 per cent. The banks are bound to make money. They cannot fail when interest rates remain at that level. The wealthy have had the money. Tax decreases have not been given to those near the pensioners' bracket. They have gone to the wealthy.
We are not just arguing for a married couple's pension of half average earnings and a single person's pension of one third average earnings. We are also calling for the abolition of standing charges. I have a letter in my pocket from a constituent whose gas bill was £22, 60 per cent. of which went towards the standing charge. That is why pensioners should get free television licences, for example.
The Republic of Ireland, supposedly one of the poorest countries in the world, gives its pensioners free television licences and free passes on road, rail and ferry services, yet it is said that that cannot be done in Britain where North sea oil gushes out of every pore. What nonsense! That typifies the Tory Government. They even attacked the pensioners last Friday by blocking the Bill to help the disabled, many of whom are elderly and suffer from NHS cuts and so on.
Without a doubt, the Labour party is on the side of the pensioners. Much more could be said, but I need only repeat that money is found for Trident and the Falklands and that the banks have made huge profits. Currently £17,000 million is paid to the unemployed. If those 3 to 4 million people were in full-time work and paying taxes and insurance contributions, that real wealth could be distributed.
The Labour party's main argument is that the Government have deliberately run down the economy. They have prevented 4 million people from paying taxes and insurance contributions so that they could shift the balance of power away from the workers and towards the bosses. As a result the pensioners and others like them have suffered. That is the reason why they have lost purchasing power.
Until we turf out the Government, the chances of improving the pensioners' lot are very slim. That is why I welcome the motion. It could have been toughened up to be exactly parallel to the motion that was before the Labour party conference. But make no mistake, when the next Labour Government take office they must carry the motion into practice.

9 pm

Mr. John Powley: If rhetoric and loud noises paid pensioners, they would undoubtedly be well off should the Opposition come to office. Neither rhetoric nor loud talk pays the pensions that we want the elderly to have. The realisation of hard cash pays for benefits for any section of the community. It does not matter whether we are talking about pensioners, the disabled or the chronically sick. If we have no cash, we cannot give benefits. The Opposition can say what they like, but rhetoric does not produce cash for any section of the community.

Mr. Canavan: rose—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member does not appear to be giving way.

Mr. Powley: Opposition Members—

Mr. Canavan: rose—

Mr. Powley: Opposition Members have derided the word "profit" and those who make profits. I am in business in a small way and my company makes a profit

Mr. McKelvey: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. In a debate about the living standard of pensioners, is it in order for the hon. Member to give his living standards?

Mrs. Kellett-Bowman: How ludicrous!

Mr. Powley: Whatever benefits or pensions the Government give, most of the money comes from the profits of companies or from individuals. If they do not make profits, they cannot pay their taxes. They are a means of revenue for the Government and that is how they provide pensions and benefits. Without that revenue, pensions would not be paid.
I do not like the traditional way in which Opposition Members deliberately try to manipulate the emotions of sections of the community. Today they are manipulating the pensioners and trying to inflame emotions. Last Friday they tried to manipulate the chronically sick and disabled in an effort to further their cause. I regard their behaviour as disgraceful.
My opponent at the last general election told his audience on untold occasions, be it pensioners, schools or nurses, "We will give you everything if we are elected. We will give more to the Health Service, to the pensioner and to the education service". Not once during the debate has any Opposition Member told us where the money will come from. If we add up what the Opposition have said, they would find it impossible to produce the goods. They would be unable to give anybody anything as they would not have the resources.

Mr. Canavan: rose—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Powley) is obviously not giving way.

Mr. Powley: The hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) can deride the IMF as much as he likes, but he knows that when the Labour Government got into trouble in 1975 and 1976, and could not give pensioners their Christmas bonus, they had to be bailed out by it in order to save this country from becoming bankrupt.
This Government's record is absolutely first class. It represents realism rather than the rhetoric that we have heard tonight from the Opposition.

Mr. William McKelvey: I know that I must be brief, but hon. Members will accept that my speech will not be any incantation of rhetoric. The maiden speech made by the hon. Member for York (Mr. Gregory) certainly showed that he has a humane streak. The first part of his speech contained many progressive elements that we would all support, but unfortunately the second part showed that he has already been contaminated by the company that he is keeping on the Conservative Benches.
In response to many of the points raised by Conservative Members I should like to quote something factual. Fortuitously, a letter from a pensioner landed on my desk today. I shall read it out as quickly as possible.


It is from Margaret Cameron, 15 Main Road, Low Fenwick, Ayrshire. She certainly cannot be accused of rhetoric when she states:
Dear Mr. McKelvey, I am sure you will not be surprised to receive my protest against further increases in the electricity charges suggested for April 1984. I am now 91 and it is a great strain to meet the heating costs of heating in the winter. So much so that I only heat one room. It would appear we have many power stations in Scotland and yet electricity is not be be cheaper. My old age pension has only been increased by £1·04p and this month is already fully absorbed by my increase in the cost of living. Why does industry need such huge profits? We elderly people will never live to experience or enjoy the advantages of the technological age much less be able to afford them, so why do you make us pay for them? I write for your comments and interest in this matter.
Now that that letter has been recorded in Hansard, the Minister may be able to answer the very questions that that 91-year-old lady asked. We must all have felt the drop in temperature this morning. We shiver on a cold morning. But let us think of what that means to the elderly. The point is that hypothermia will be with us very shortly. Unfortunately, no figures are available to show exactly how many elderly and infirm people will die this winter because they cannot afford to heat even a single room. It is not a question of asking where the money will come from. We do not need any money. Scotland has a surplus of electricity and there is now more coal above the ground than we have had for the past decade. We could give them coal for their coal fires and free electricity. We do not even need to cancel Trident to prevent them from suffering from hypothermia.

Mr. Canavan: rose—

Mr. McKelvey: I would be happy to give way to my hon. Friend, but have been told that I have only one minute in which to speak. I shall probably use the remaining time to explain some of the points that my hon. Friend would have raised. Like me, he takes an active part in the fight against fuel poverty. Pensioners suffer abjectly from fuel poverty. The old lady who wrote to me expressed the fears of the elderly on that subject.
Unfortunately, the hon. Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) is not in the Chamber. He spoke of the pensioners' fear of muggers and of the violence perpetrated on the streets. None of us would tolerate that. Indeed, we all abhor it. There are other ways in which old people are violated. One of them is insidious—if they are not given the proper facilities to keep their homes or at least one of their rooms adequately heated, thousands of old people will die of hypothermia this year. That type of violent crime need not happen, because we have surplus coal stocks and electricity.

Mr. Jeff Rooker: I congratulate the hon. Member for York (Mr. Gregory) on his maiden speech. I should like to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen) who has sat through the whole debate, yet has not been able to make a speech—I am not criticising the Chair—because the hon. Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Powley) bowled into the Chamber when the Tories had run out of Members to make speeches. The hon. Gentleman made a speech based on ignorance and prejudice and deprived my hon. Friend of the opportunity to speak.
I do not believe that anyone could disagree with the first part of the motion:
That this House regrets that this week's pension uprating is below the current rate of inflation".
It is therefore natural to call on the Government to change their discredited economic policies. We shall continue to do that as long as they remain in office and impose cuts.
My hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) concentrated on the mechanics of the financial side of pensioners' standard of living. I shall widen the debate slightly and deal with matters that other hon. Members have mentioned to encompass the quality of life of old people.
The Government have produced voluminous documents about the problems of the elderly. Recently, I re-read sections from their booklet, "Care in Action", of 1981. In that document the Government admitted that elderly people have often been provided with an unacceptably low standard of care. They then set the priorities and objectives for health authorities and local government. The Government said that those bodies should
strengthen the primary and community care services, together with neighbourhood and voluntary support, to enable elderly people to live at home.
Later in the same year we had the White Paper, "Growing Older". The conclusion reads:
To enable people to enjoy secure, dignified and fulfilled lives in their later years is a large and ambitious objective. It will never be possible to achieve it for everyone, but there is no doubt that society can do more for its elderly members.
Many of the services that translate that rhetoric into action are the responsibility of local government. Social services departments provide services in so far as the Treasury allows them to do so. Early this year, the Department of the Environment published its audit on social services departments. That document reveals massive variations in expenditure on the elderly. It can vary as much as plus or minus 37 per cent. In a typical area with a population of 500,000, containing 75,000 elderly people, spending varied by plus or minus £2 million per annum. Spending on the over-75s varied as much as plus or minus 42 per cent. between different local authorities. We should be aware that 50 per cent. of spending on social services is accounted for by residential accommodation, that nearly 33 per cent. is accounted for by the home help service and that no other provision accounts for more than 4 per cent. of spending. That shows that a relatively small shift in the expenditure that social services departments are allowed can have a catastrophic effect on elderly people.
The most recent report by the Association of Directors of Social Services of November 1982 pointed out that the frail elderly are three times more likely to get home help or meals on wheels if they live in a northern urban area than if they live in a southern county area. That is why some of my hon. Friends representing northern constituencies find that local authorities in urban areas, which are not famed for being under Tory control are having cuts imposed through the rate capping procedure of the Department of the Environment. Those authorities are spending on services for frail elderly people three times more than is spent by authorities in the south controlled by the Conservatives.
Let me highlight the differences between investment per head of the population in caring for the elderly. Five social services departments were found to invest over per head of the population, and 15 spent less than £30 per


head of the population. We can imagine the political control of those social services departments. My point is that in no other aspect of local government services would such a wide range of standards be tolerated. It is simply because there is too much discretion, and standards are not good enough under the law. Tory-controlled shire counties take advantage of this and do not provide a good and adequate service.
The Association of Directors of Social Services—this makes the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) has made—concluded:
This leads to standards of care well below what a rich civilised society should tolerate 
We are a rich society. There is money galore for improving services for elderly people. In virtually every debate every day there are examples of where expenditure could be cut and the money transferred to the care of the elderly. The Exchequer is now getting revenue from the North sea amounting to £8 billion. It was not getting a penny piece four years ago. That £8 billion, which is coming in as a windfall to the Government, is being frittered away because none is directed towards the services for the elderly.
What happened in the House last Friday has not gone unnoticed. Many elderly people are disabled. One can draw the connection between what happened on Friday and the audit report. I am not sure about the motives for the report, but it provides useful information and evidence and gives a breakdown of the number of disabled among the elderly. Some 50 per cent., one way or the other, can live satisfactorily without being supported by others; but 2 per cent. cannot handle the most basic task without assistance and 35 per cent. cannot do heavy household cleaning. Altogether, 50 per cent. of our elderly, to a greater or lesser extent, depend upon the services provided by the general community.
We saw the Government's aims in a document published in 1981, but what action has been taken? The Government's White Paper on public expenditure imposed a cut of 4 per cent. in social services departments in the year 1980–81. That was supposed to be followed by a 2 per cent. growth, which the Select Committee in its second report in 1982 said was not enough. That 2 per cent. would not be enough even to keep standards at the present level.
The 1980 expenditure cuts were substantial, and, as reports from social services departments have made abundantly clear, they have not been recovered. It is easier for social services directors to cut services, such as aids and adaptations, than to close an old people's home. Such cuts are made quickly, but their after-effects create massive problems for the elderly. The Government have not realised that.
In the Birmingham social services department the position has become so bad that the chairman was forced to report to the committee on 9 March this year:
I am advised by the City Solicitor that it is not proper to recommend to the Committee that the Council ignores its statutory obligations.
That Tory chairman had reached the point where, because of the cuts imposed by the Government, he had to contemplate throwing out of the window some of the statutory obligations of the social services department. The Association of Directors of Social Services reported in 1980–81 that 74 out of the 78 reporting authorities had

made cuts that affected mainly the handicapped and the elderly. My hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West quoted the directors as saying that those cuts would
foreshorten the lives of the elderly.
As late as 1982 the association complained that it was receiving two different messages from the Government. The report stated:
We are also confused by the fact that we get two totally different messages from Central Government; firstly the DHSS say we must expand slightly our expenditure on social services, whilst the Department of the Environment, and Mr Heseltine in particular"—
I suspect that the present Secretary of State is no different—
say we must reduce Local Government expenditure.
The association also stated that a
4 per cent., or even 6 per cent., growth would only begin to reflect the type of service development required to prevent standards from dropping.
However, the Government told authorities to cut 4 percent. in 1980 and to plan for 2 per cent. growth later. The association also said that the country had entered such a massive recession since 1980 that the promise of a 2 per cent. growth went out of the window, and that a 4 per cent. to 6 per cent. growth was needed to stop services deteriorating.
The headline in The Guardian on Monday of this week, even with that track record of damage to the elderly, stated:
Lawson firm on welfare cutbacks.
That contrasts with the headline in the Financial Times of 12 October:
Biffen warns against social service cuts.
Who in the Cabinet will win that battle? Who will stand up for the elderly, who are being crushed by the Government's cuts? We know that the Leader of the House knows the score, because he has made it abundantly clear. Some of us rely on him, in his quieter moments, to restrain some of the Chancellor's plans.
It is clear that the present Secretary of State, who has made all the cuts demanded of him, in so far as he has never admitted that he has not, has seen the light of day. I welcome his announcement today of an inquiry. In next year's Budget the Prime Minister and the Chancellor cannot muck about with the Pensions Act 1975, because the right hon. Gentleman's inquiry will still be continuing. We shall win a breathing space of another year. It is clear from the speeches of Treasury Ministers, past and present, that the Government wish to tinker with or completely to change the 1975 earnings-related pensions scheme.
Although it is clear from the Government Actuary's report, which the Government have taken on board, that changes must be made, the population has a contract with Parliament—not with the Tory Government or with a Labour Government, because, of the 20 million people who work, about 50 per cent. are contracted in and the rest are contracted out—for that pension scheme before it comes into full working order in 1988. Neither the population nor the Opposition will tolerate the Government slashing that scheme simply because they wish to privatise or to make cuts, or because the Prime Minister says that there will be too many pensioners by the time that she becomes one. The right hon. Lady need not worry about an old-age pension. She will have the cushion of a Prime Minister's pension, and she will never know what it is like to be a pensioner such as the one mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock and Loudon (Mr. McKelvey).
The Government speak with a forked tongue. The Department of the Environment audit of social services departments was carried out partly to ensure that district auditors could see that local social services departments were providing value for money. However, the document "Care in Action", when talking about community-based packages of care, stated:
The 'cost-effectiveness' of these packages often depends on not putting a financial value on the contribution of informal carers.
They include the voluntary sector and the families out of whom the Government are squeezing yet more time and financial resources. On the one hand there is the question of value for money, and on the other hand there is cost-effectiveness. When the Government talk about the cost-effectiveness and efficiency in the service, they rely on not including the full contribution to the care of the elderly.
Many hon. Members have mentioned home helps. Home helps create wealth. They create just as much wealth as the factory owners, because they enable people to lead fuller lives and allow other members of families to keep on working and contribute to the community. It is true that between 1978 and 1982 there was an increase in home helps, from 44,000 to 47,000, but in fact the number has fallen as a percentaage of the elderly population. That is what counts. The percentage has fallen in respect of the over-75s from 1·8 per cent. in 1978 to 1·7 per cent. in 1982. That looks small, but it is many hundreds of home helps for the over-75s in the country. The percentage has fallen from 9·7 per cent. in 1978 to 8·9 per cent. in 1982—that is home helps as a percentage of the population over 85. That should be the key part of the home help service. Nevertheless, in the area where the demand is greatest the number of home helps has been cut—in real terms, not in absolute numbers.
The Centre for Policy on Aging said in a recent report that it estimates that only half of the people who are in moderate need received the service. Time does not permit me to go into the details that it gave, but the document that it produced was considerable, dealing with the research evidence. It used official figures for people in only moderate need, and it said that only half of those people actually received home help service. Under this Government, for the first time, the social services departments have charged people on supplementary pensions for home helps.
Reference has been made to meals on wheels. There are now 27,000 fewer meals on wheels a week than under the Labour Government. That is an absolute disgrace, when one realises that the need has risen. In 1979–80, the number was 41·7 million. The system was already in force then, and the Government could not change it quickly. In 1981–82, it was 40·3 million—1·4 million fewer meals on wheels a year. That is a scandal. After all, more people die during the winter months than during the summer months. One reason is the lack of heating. Another reason is an inadequate supply of nutritious hot food, and that is a direct result of the fact that 27,000 fewer people a week are getting meals on wheels.
Many of my hon. Friends have mentioned the subject of fuel. The Government intend to tax fuel. Whether or not they call it a tax, that is clearly the Government's intention. The Minister for Social Security wrote a long letter recently to Age Concern. I do not want to quote the

hon. Gentleman out of context, but he said in that letter that the Government used the introduction of the housing benefit scheme to provide a "convenient opportunity" to take anomalies out of the existing rules on heating additions. What that really meant was that a lot of old people have lost £4·65 a week. Irrespective of what the anomalies were, a lot of old people lost more than £4 a week on the heating addition, as a result of the introduction of housing benefit.
Many tower blocks have their underfloor heating switched off. Calor gas canisters proliferate in many blocks, in contravention of the safety rules that we all know about and constantly tell our constituents about. However, when electricity bills reach £75 to £80 a month a pensioner under a Tory Government is in real trouble. I know of one tower block where the heating is still on. The March 1983 bill for one flat, which was occupied by a lady of over 80, was £294·81. The lady was housebound, and she was not even getting all the heating additions to which she was entitled from the DHSS. She was terrified. As my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West said, the elderly today get up at 10 am and go to bed by 6 pm. That is a thundering disgrace, given the wealth that is around.
The Government have taken the opportunity to cut £3 million from pensioners with dependent children. They never referred to that. It slipped through in one of the orders in July. They also took money from widowed mothers by changing the rules of the uprating. None of the Ministers or press releases referred to that fact. About 200 pages of orders slipped through the House just after the general election. The Opposition plead guilty to not spotting the provisions.
No one could argue that the pension has not been cut this week. I will not quote the statistics. I will settle for the headline of The Times of 19 November:
Rising pensions fail to keep pace with prices.
That is good enough for The Times,  me and my constituents.
One or two hon. Members referred to the chiropody service, which faces a complete crisis. The Government have been slipshod. The Secretary of State may smirk?—

Mr. Fowler: I am not.

Mr. Rooker: The right hon. Gentleman was not smirking. I withdraw that remark. He knows as well as I do that the Birmingham foot clinic is under threat of closure because of the squeeze on district health authorities.
Housing benefit cannot be ignored, because of the disastrous effect of its introduction. I have Government figures which show that 1·1 million pensioners lost out when the scheme started. I and my hon. Friends have received an estimate, resulting from the Chancellor's announcement last Thursday, of the consequences of next April's changes in housing benefit. There will be 2·26 million losers of whom 1·15 million are pensioners. I do not care what their income levels are but 1·11 million more losers among pensioners is unacceptable, given the wealth in this country. The cut has been made because the Cabinet is blindly ignorant of how the housing benefit scheme works, as any hon. Member who sat in Committee and watched the orders go through the House could testify.
The hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Mrs. Knight) was right when she said that it is not true that there are no problems in Birmingham. There still are. It was


guaranteed that everyone would be on full housing benefit by 31 December this year. The scheme was supposed to start in April, for the last group of people who were to be transferred. Yesterday I came across a constituent of 80-plus who had not received housing benefit. My constituent had not received a penny piece since April. The private landlord is going bananas. However, he is not threatening eviction, like the city council. The city council threatens people with eviction for not paying their own housing benefit.
Today's generation of elderly people have passed through more dramatic changes in society than any other generation. Go back to the first or second world wars, the first depression, the massive recession that we are suffering now, the change in technology, values and attitudes, and this group of elderly people is utterly bewildered by what it has had to put up with for the first time.
The Government come along with their penny-pinching measures, whatever they may say about the retail price index. They are the first Government to bring a Bill before the House to cut pensions by 1p in the pound. Whatever the arguments and statistics about the previous Labour Government, at the end of the day pensioners were 20p in the pound better off, after inflation, compared to the 3 per cent. of the first four years of this Government.

Mr. Paul Marland: What about the Christmas bonus?

Mr. Rooker: Even if we count the Christmas bonus in the pensioners' annual income, we are quids in compared with the Tory party, and the hon. Gentleman knows it. If the Tories were so confident, they would have increased the Christmas bonus. We have reached the point when, if we do not defend the elderly, this Government will defeat them. That is why I ask my hon. Friends to join me in the Lobby tonight.

The Minister for Social Security (Dr. Rhodes Boyson): This has been at times an emotional as well as a rational debate, and we have been privileged to hear a speech from the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner). I cannot say that I agreed with him, but I enjoyed what he said. This House is made up of people with all kinds of characteristics and ideas and is, I hope, representative of all people in this country.
From the Government Benches—for example, from my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Morrison)—came not only support for the amendment, to which I shall come, but some prodding from time to time about various actions that we should take. There cannot be any hon. Member who is not concerned for the standard of living of the pensioner. I do not bow to anybody in any other party when it comes to compassion. The question is how to do it so that in the long run not only the pensioner but the country is better off, because, if the country is not better off, the pensioner will not be better off. In the realisation of that lies the diffence between the two sides of the House.
My hon. Friends the Members for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) and for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) made it clear that they, like all Conservative Members, feel as much as anybody for the mentally and physically

handicapped, the old and the young. As they pointed out, it is a question of so ordering our society that, in the long run, we can raise their standard of living.
I come to our record with the pensioners. In the five years from November 1978 to November 1983 there was 70 per cent. inflation while the uprating of the pensions was 75 per cent. The living standard of pensioners is marginally better now than when the pensioners rejoiced at the failure of Labour and its defeat in the May 1979 election. It is only marginally better and we should have liked to have done better, but that has been achieved.
Reference was made from the Liberal Benches to the pensioners' price index. Compared with that index -which has increased by only 64·3 per cent.—the 75 per cent. uprating is even higher. Reference was also made—I will not dwell on it too much because I do not want unduly to hurt the feelings of Opposition Members—to the tragic history of the Labour party in 1975–76, to Christmas bonuses not being paid, and to £500 million being taken away by a 15 per cent. uprating instead of a 21 per cent. uprating. Compared with that record, we have no apologies to make.
Heating additions have gone up by 8·6 per cent. in this month's uprating. In 1980 the Conservatives gave to supplementary pensioners over the age of 70 an automatic heating addition. The cost of that addition is now £200 million, going to 1½ million supplementary pensioners. When that is linked with the automatic giving, as happened in 1980, of heating additions to families on supplementary benefit with children below the age of five, it means £100 million more in real terms in heating allowances than in 1978–79. Therefore, the old and the young are getting more than they were when we came to power.
As for heating addition rates, since 1978 heating allowance rates have gone up by 140 per cent. compared with fuel costs rising by 100 per cent. Thus, not only are we giving the allowance to more people, but what we are giving is more valuable.
Consider what we have done for the 60-year-olds, those who unfortunately—as we get the economy of the nation right—are still unemployed. In November 1981 we decided that the unemployed at the age of 60 should after one year go on to the higher rate of supplementary benefit. That was done by the Conservative Government.
In 1983 we gave automatic credits to all unemployed men between 60 and 65 to help them fill gaps in their contribution record. That, too, was done by this Government. In June of this year we decided that a 60-year-old unemployed person should immediately go on the higher rate of supplementary benefit. That makes a difference of £11 for a couple and £7·50 for a single person. That also was done by this Government.

Mr. Foulkes: What about the death grant?

Mr. Boyson: The facts that I am mentioning are worrying the hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes), but he will have to listen to what I am saying; he may even enjoy it. I respect him highly and I listened to him. His turn has now come to listen.
We inherited in 1979 a mobility allowance of £10—it is now £19, an increase of 90 per cent., which is 5·3 per cent. more than the increase in transport costs during that time. Again we have done more than could be expected.
I hate to mention the Christmas bonus again but we have made it statutory. Now it must be paid. It is not a decision made in any year.

Mr. Foulkes: What about the death grant?

Dr. Boyson: I have not yet reached the death grant. I am dealing with old-age pensioners—I have not reached the undertakers yet.
The debt of honour of our manifesto pledge in 1979 to war widows for pensions and allowances to be tax exempt was carried out immediately after the 1979 election. A great many people were involved. For those who want to continue working we have increased the earnings limit form £57 to £65 for men between 65 and 70 and for women aged between 60 and 65. That is a 14 per cent. increase. That is not chickenfeed. It is 9 per cent. more than inflation. They can earn their additional money without losing.
On supplementary benefits, we have increased by 50 per cent. in two years, from £2,000 to £3,000, the minimum amount a person may have before he can claim supplementary benefit. Many more people can have assistance, as my right hon. Friend said. We have allowed at the same time £1,500 of life assurance to be disregarded so that people can still have supplementary benefit.

Mr. Foulkes: rose—

Dr. Boyson: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman is listening. Other hon. Members were not here and I could not rely on the hon. Gentleman to tell them.
A person can have capital of £500, against £300 last year, before his entitlement to supplementary benefit single payments is affected.

Mr. Foulkes: What about the death grant?

Dr. Boyson: I have not yet reached the death grant. I am dealing with low income families. I have not mentioned death grant. But I would not want the hon. Gentleman to worry because I have not mentioned it. I did not intend to mention it but because of his persistence he will get his reward.
According to the DHSS report that came out recently 100,000 fewer pensioners in 1981 compared with 1979 were below supplementary benefit level. I have quoted 1981 because it will be another year or two before we have the 1983 figures. I shall come back to the hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley when I have those figures and bring him up to date.
As for job release, where people retire early so that someone else can take their job, the Labour Government spent £22 million in 1978–79. In the past year we have spent £212 million to enable older people to leave their jobs so that others can take them.
The hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) dodged the issue of inflation. Inflation is the most terrible thing for someone who has saved up—however small those savings are—to supplement the pension and to live on the interest of what has been saved. Few people in this country today do not have savings of some type. There are quite a number of people, including Labour voters—not just those who want to buy their council houses—with savings. As my right hon. Friend said, there was 110 per cent. inflation in 5½ years of Labour Government. Every £100 that was put away was eroded in value by more

than half after that 5½ years. It is no wonder that some grandmothers are still frightened to talk to members of the Labour party when they come around after dark. By bringing back the value of money we have helped pensioners. The value of money is essential to a good and healthy society. Pensioners gain from that.

Mr. Rooker: I want the Minister to explain housing benefits. Why does he believe that the index-linked bonds that were introduced under the last Labour Government were called granny bonds?

Dr. Boyson: We wanted a property-owning democracy and every granny with a bond. I am prepared to appear on television with the hon. Gentleman advertising that throughout the length and breadth of the country.
In discussing housing benefits, I come to the most difficult part of my script. When I have lived through this debate, I can take even death in its stride. About £4 billion is going to about one third of houses. Housing benefits have been given to those on increasingly high levels of income and greater amounts have been spent. The adjustments to housing benefit, to which the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) referred, will mean a cut of about 5 per cent. in total expenditure. However, the needs allowances are being uprated this November by about 4 per cent. At the end of next April 2½ million out of 4 million pensioners on housing benefits will still be better off than they were in April of this year, even after taking account of the changes last April, the November uprating and next April's changes. Of the pensioners affected, nearly one third will lose less than 25p a week and over half will lose less than 50p a week.
I give three cases of senior citizens on housing benefits. The recent changes have no effect on the housing benefit of a non-dependent son or daughter living with his or her pensioner parents and who is at school, on the youth training scheme or on supplementary benefit. If a pensioner is living as a non-dependent with his son or daughter there is no change of housing benefit. If a pensioner's income is no more than £9·75 above a state pension, there is no change in housing benefit. It is wrong to say that the Government have said, "Who are the poorest in the land? Let us line them up and do the worst that we can for them." We have protected those on supplementary benefit and the lowest incomes. I believe that at one time the philosophy of the Labour party was to look after those who were the worst off in our society.
About 500,000 families will be helped from next April with £1 a week extra when we increase the dependent children's addition to the needs allowance. There were problems in Birmingham when a computer broke down. Local authorities quickly complained that the system was not working. I have received no further request for extensions to the transitional arrangements for implementing housing benefit, although extensions have twice been given.
I shall now deal with the pensions inquiry. I will then give a short summing up. I am sure that hon. Members would be disappointed if I did not do that. [Interruption.] There is clearly approval for that.

Mr. Foulkes: What about the death grant?

Dr. Boyson: Yes, then there is the death grant. The hon. Gentleman should come to all my meetings, not just some of them.
I inherited—if that is the right expression—a report on the death grant. There were replies from some 700 people, some with large petitions, referring to three ways in which the death grant could be dealt with. Of that total, 55 per cent. said that they did not like any of the proposals, 30 per cent. just wanted the grant increased and the other 15 per cent. we could not understand. We are still studying the 15 per cent., but there was an overwhelming decision.
To uprate the death grant in line with the present cost of funerals would cost hundreds of millions of pounds.

Mr. Rooker: Two hundred.

Dr. Boyson: I accept the hon. Gentleman's figure. At least £200 million would be added. That money is not available. The choice is, therefore, between allocating the available funds through means-testing, to which the Opposition object, and giving it to those most in need or doing it in some other way. With regard to those who have no income at all, last year some 11,000 such people were paid an average of £200 for funerals, so it is not true that people with nothing cannot get grants.

Mr. Foulkes: I am sure that the Minister will agree that this is no laughing matter. The people who replied may have been confused, but it is not their business to make a decision. It is the Government's business. Will the Minister give a clear assurance that an announcement will be made, preferably before Christmas, about the future of the death grant, since it is something for which people have been waiting for four years?

Dr. Boyson: I assure the hon. Gentleman that we shall move at least as fast as the Labour Government on this.

Mr. Skinner: Will the Minister give way?

Dr. Boyson: No, I listened to the hon. Gentleman without interrupting him.
Social security expenditure by the Government in real terms is 20 per cent. higher than it was in 1978 under the Labour Government, so we shall take no objections from Labour Members about what we are doing. Increased expenditure of £748 million was provided for in the spring Budget this year and the autumn statement provided a further increase in social security expenditure of £163 million. We have no apologies to make in relation to our spending on the social security system.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State referred today to other important long-term factors. My hon. Friend the Member for York (Mr. Gregory) in his maiden speech, the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) for the Liberals, my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. McCrindle) and the hon. Member for Oldham, West in opening for the Opposition all referred to the need for an inquiry to get the long-term question of pensions right. I trust that we can deal with this in an entirely non-partisan manner. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said, similar changes were made in 1975 when he was Opposition spokesman. We trust that the same will apply now.
There are four further points. First, on occupational pensions, there is the problem of the early leaver. Employees in occupational schemes often have no option but to join and accept the terms given. The terms are often unfavourable if the employee leaves for another job because the entitlement is likely to be frozen. We all receive letters about that. The Government have accepted the majority report of the Occupational Pensions Board in

1981 requiring uprating of pension rights by 5 per cent. per annum or up to 5 per cent. if inflation is lower, as we trust that it will be in years to come if the Conservatives remain in power.

Mr. Foulkes: We have heard all that.

Dr. Boyson: Not all hon. Members were present earlier, or does the hon. Gentleman propose to tell the others outside?
A consultative document will be issued next Tuesday asking for comments by the end of February 1984 on the option of legislation in the 1984–85 parliamentary Session.
Secondly, on disclosure of information, the 1982 report of the Occupational Pensions Board recommended improvements in the information available not only on individual pension rights but on the overall schemes, on audited accounts, actuarial valuations, annual trustee reports and investment reports. As for the publication of that report, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State accepted the need in principle to legislate on disclosure and established a working group, which has reported on issues such as a register of occupational pension schemes and clarification of trustee and employee responsibilities. We shall issue a consultative document early next year with the aim of including disclosure measures in proposed legislation for early leavers.
We must also consider the report of Professor Gower, which is expected shortly, on the adequacy of provisions for protecting investors in and beneficiaries of investment funds.
In addition, as my right hon. Friend has said, we are setting up a pensions inquiry to report shortly on the whole question of the adequacy and cost of state, occupational and private provision for retirement and portability of pension rights. The Select Committee report on the retirement age will also be taken fully into consideration. Tomorrow the Government's response to the report by the Select Committee on Social Services will be published. My hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Sir D. Price) will introduce a debate on retirement age in the House on Friday this week.
A good life for the pensioner depends not just on the amount of money that he receives but on living a useful life in society. We should see that that is so, as people live longer. Flexible retirement means that one can choose when one retires. People are changing their jobs much more often up to the age of 60 or 65, and they do all sorts of things later. It is most satisfying for any senior citizen to feel that he is part of the family, has a job to do and is part of the community.
I recently read a book by Eric Midwinter. It was a biography of W. G. Grace, a person of considerable versatility. It is well worth reading because of what he said about the university of the third age. Some time in the future we shall have to start thinking about education from the age of 60 onwards. I trust that we shall also be able to do that in a bipartisan fashion.
Pensioners are part of society. They are concerned not just about money coming in. I read a Gallup poll this month, which may interest hon. Members. Twice as many pensioners are concerned about defence as about pensions. There is no doubt which party they support on that—the Conservative party. More pensioners are concerned about inflation than about pensions. Again, more will support the Conservative party. Of the number of pensioners most


concerned about pensions 60 per cent. are most concerned about law and order. We are charged with depriving pensioners of the high living standards that they deserve. However, they are not so concerned about that. According to the first report of the British crime survey, they are more concerned than young people about law and order on the streets. Again, the Conservative party is concerned about law and order.
The Opposition's motion states that we are
depriving pensioners of the higher living standards they deserve.
No one in the House believes that pensioners do not deserve high living standards. However, we must get the economy going so that we can pay them what they deserve. Also, throughout one's life, one must consider carefully one's income and expenditure, so that one has a satisfactory retirement. Pensioners deserve a good standard of living, but we can give it to them only when we get the economy right. As well as doing that we need to decrease the rate of inflation and increase production, and then we shall have the capacity to look after the young and the old, and the mentally and physically handicapped. Until then, it is no good saying what people deserve. The hon. Member for Bolsover may deserve more. But until we get the economy right, we cannot offer more, even to the hon. Gentleman.
A Gallup poll in June showed the way in which pensioners voted at the election. Today Opposition Members claimed to speak with concern and integrity on their behalf. According to the Gallup poll, 48 per cent. of 65-year-olds, and people over 65 voted Conservative compared to 33 per cent. who voted Labour, and 19 per cent. who voted for the alliance. They believe that we are the Government to get the country right and to give them what they deserve.

Mr. James Hamilton: rose in his place and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.

Question, That the Question be now put, put and agreed to.

Question put accordingly, That the original words stand part of the Question:—

The House divided: Ayes 197, Noes 343.

Division No. 76]
[10.00 pm


AYES


Abse, Leo
Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)


Adams, Allen (Paisley N)
Brown, N. (N'c'tle-u-Tyne E)


Alton, David
Brown, R. (N'c'tle-u-Tyne N)


Anderson, Donald
Brown, Ron (E'burgh, Leith)


Archer, Rt Hon Peter
Caborn, Richard


Ashdown, Paddy
Callaghan, Jim (Heyw'd &amp; M)


Ashley, Rt Hon Jack
Campbell, Ian


Ashton, Joe
Canavan, Dennis


Atkinson, N. (Tottenham)
Carlile, Alexander (Montg'y)


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Carter-Jones, Lewis


Banks, Tony (Newham NW)
Cartwright, John


Barnett, Guy
Clark, Dr David (S Shields)


Barron, Kevin
Clay, Robert


Beckett, Mrs Margaret
Cocks, Rt Hon M. (Bristol S.)


Beith, A. J.
Cohen, Harry


Bell, Stuart
Coleman, Donald



Bennett, A. (Dent'n &amp; Red'sh)
Concannon, Rt Hon J. D.


Bermingham, Gerald
Conlan, Bernard


Bidwell, Sydney
Cook, Robin F. (Livingston)


Blair, Anthony
Corbett, Robin


Boothroyd, Miss Betty
Corbyn, Jeremy


Boyes, Roland
Cowans, Harry


Brown, Gordon (D'f'mline E)
Craigen, J. M.





Crowther, Stan
Marek, Dr John


Cunningham, Dr John
Marshall, David (Shettleston)


Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (L'lli)
Martin, Michael


Davies, Ronald (Caerphilly)
Mason, Rt Hon Roy


Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'ge H'l)
Maxton, John


Deakins, Eric
Maynard, Miss Joan



Dixon, Donald
Meacher, Michael


Dobson, Frank
Meadowcroft, Michael


Dormand, Jack
Michie, William


Douglas, Dick
Millan, Rt Hon Bruce


Dubs, Alfred
Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)


Duffy, A. E. P.
Mitchell, Austin (G't Grimsby)


Eadie, Alex
Morris, Rt Hon A. (W'shawe)


Eastham, Ken
Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)


Ellis, Raymond
Nellist, David


Evans, Ioan (Cynon Valley)
Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon


Evans, John (St. Helens N)
O'Brien, William


Ewing, Harry
O'Neill, Martin


Fatchett, Derek
Park, George


Faulds, Andrew
Parry, Robert


Field, Frank (Birkenhead)
Patchett, Terry


Fields, T. (L'pool Broad Gn)
Pendry, Tom


Fisher, Mark
Penhaligon, David


Flannery, Martin
Pike, Peter


Forrester, John
Powell, Raymond (Ogmore)


Foster, Derek
Prescott, John


Foulkes, George
Radice, Giles


Fraser, J. (Norwood)
Randall, Stuart


Freeson, Rt Hon Reginald
Redmond, M.


Freud, Clement
Richardson, Ms Jo


Garrett, W. E.
Roberts, Ernest (Hackney N)


Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Robertson, George


Godman, Dr Norman
Robinson, G. (Coventry NW)


Golding, John
Rogers, Allan


Gould, Bryan
Rooker, J. W.


Hamilton, James (M'well N)
Ross, Ernest (Dundee W)


Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Harman, Ms Harriet
Rowlands, Ted


Harrison, Rt Hon Walter
Ryman, John


Hart, Rt Hon Dame Judith
Sedgemore, Brian


Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Sheerman, Barry


Healey, Rt Hon Denis
Sheldon, Rt Hon R.


Heffer, Eric S.
Shore, Rt Hon Peter


Hogg, N. (C'nauld &amp; Kilsyth)
Short, Ms Clare (Ladywood)


Holland, Stuart (Vauxhall)
Short, Mrs (W'hampt'n NE)


Home Robertson, John
Silkin, Rt Hon J.


Howells, Geraint
Skinner, Dennis


Hoyle, Douglas
Smith, C.(lsl'ton S &amp; F'bury)


Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Smith, Rt Hon J. (M'kl'ds E)


Hughes, Roy (Newport East)
Soley, Clive


Hughes, Sean (Knowsley S)
Spearing, Nigel


Hughes, Simon (Southwark)
Steel, Rt Hon David


Janner, Hon Greville
Stewart, Rt Hon D. (W Isles)


Jenkins, Rt Hon Roy (Hillh'd)
Stott, Roger


John, Brynmor
Straw, Jack


Jones, Barry (Alyn &amp; Deeside)
Thomas, Dafydd (Merioneth)


Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald
Thomas, Dr R. (Carmarthen)


Kennedy, Charles
Thompson, J. (Wansbeck)


Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Thorne, Stan (Preston)


Kirkwood, Archibald
Tinn, James


Lamond, James
Torney, Tom


Leadbitter, Ted
Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.


Leighton, Ronald
Wainwright, R.


Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Wallace, James


Lewis, Terence (Worsley)
Wardell, Gareth (Gower)


Litherland, Robert
Wareing, Robert


Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)
Weetch, Ken


Lofthouse, Geoffrey
Welsh, Michael


Loyden, Edward
White, James


McCartney, Hugh
Wigley, Dafydd


McDonald, Dr Oonagh
Williams, Rt Hon A.


McGuire, Michael
Winnick, David


McKay, Allen (Penistone)
Woodall, Alec


McKelvey, William
Young, David (Bolton SE)


Mackenzie, Rt Hon Gregor



McNamara, Kevin
Tellers for the Ayes:


McTaggart, Robert
Mr. Frank Haynes and Mr. John McWilliam.


Madden, Max







NOES


Aitken, Jonathan
Eggar, Tim


Alexander, Richard
Emery, Sir Peter


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Evennett, David


Amess, David
Eyre, Reginald


Ancram, Michael
Fairbairn, Nicholas


Arnold, Tom
Fallon, Michael


Ashby, David
Favell, Anthony


Aspinwall, Jack
Fenner, Mrs Peggy


Atkins, Rt Hon Sir H.
Finsberg, Geoffrey


Atkins, Robert (South Ribble)
Fletcher, Alexander


Atkinson, David (B'm'th E)
Fookes, Miss Janet


Baker, Kenneth (Mole Valley)
Forman, Nigel


Baker, Nicholas (N Dorset)
Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)


Baldry, Anthony
Forth, Eric


Banks, Robert (Harrogate)
Fowler, Rt Hon Norman


Batiste, Spencer
Fox, Marcus


Beaumont-Dark, Anthony
Franks, Cecil


Bellingham, Henry
Fraser, Peter (Angus East)


Bendall, Vivian
Freeman, Roger


Benyon, William
Fry, Peter


Berry, Sir Anthony
Gale, Roger


Best, Keith
Galley, Roy


Bevan, David Gilroy
Gardiner, George (Reigate)


Biffen, Rt Hon John
Gardner, Sir Edward (Fylde)


Biggs-Davison, Sir John
Garel-Jones, Tristan


Blaker, Rt Hon Sir Peter
Gilmour, Rt Hon Sir Ian


Body, Richard
Glyn, Dr Alan


Bonsor, Sir Nicholas
Goodhart, Sir Philip


Bottomley, Peter
Goodlad, Alastair



Bowden, A. (Brighton K'to'n)
Gorst, John


Boyson, Dr Rhodes
Gow, Ian


Braine, Sir Bernard
Gower, Sir Raymond


Brandon-Bravo, Martin
Green way, Harry


Bright, Graham
Gregory, Conal


Brinton, Tim
Griffiths, E. (B'y St Edm'ds)


Brittan, Rt Hon Leon
Griffiths, Peter (Portsm'th N)


Brooke, Hon Peter
Grist, Ian


Brown, M. (Brigg &amp; Cl'thpes)
Ground, Patrick


Browne, John
Grylls, Michael


Bruinvels, Peter
Hamilton, Hon A. (Epsom)


Bryan, Sir Paul
Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)


Buchanan-Smith, Rt Hon A.
Hampson, Dr Keith


Buck, Sir Antony
Hanley, Jeremy


Budgen, Nick
Hannam, John


Bulmer, Esmond
Hargreaves, Kenneth


Burt, Alistair
Harris, David


Butcher, John
Harvey, Robert


Butler, Hon Adam
Haselhurst, Alan


Butterfill, John
Havers, Rt Hon Sir Michael


Carlisle, John (N Luton)
Hawksley, Warren


Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)
Hayes, J.


Carttiss, Michael
Hayhoe, Barney


Chapman, Sydney
Hayward, Robert


Chope, Christopher
Heathcoat-Amory, David


Churchill, W. S.
Heddle, John


Clark, Hon A. (Plym'th S'n)
Henderson, Barry


Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)
Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael


Clark, Sir W. (Croydon S)
Hickmet, Richard


Clarke Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Higgins, Rt Hon Terence L.


Clegg, Sir Walter
Hind, Kenneth


Cockeram, Eric
Hirst, Michael


Colvin, Michael
Hogg, Hon Douglas (Gr'th'm)


Conway, Derek
Holland, Sir Philip (Gedling)


Coombs, Simon
Holt, Richard


Cope, John
Hooson, Tom


Cormack, Patrick
Hordern, Peter


Couchman, James
Howard, Michael


Critchley, Julian
Howarth, Alan (Stratf'd-on-A)


Crouch, David
Howarth, Gerald (Cannock)


Dickens, Geoffrey
Howell, Rt Hon D. (G'ldford)


Dicks, T.
Howell, Ralph (N Norfolk)


Dorrell, Stephen
Hubbard-Miles, Peter


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord J.
Hunt, David (Wirral)


Dover, Denshore
Hunt, John (Ravensbourne)


du Cann, Rt Hon Edward
Hunter, Andrew


Dunn, Robert
Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas


Durant, Tony
Irving, Charles


Dykes, Hugh
Jackson, Robert


Edwards, Rt Hon N. (P'broke)
Jenkin, Rt Hon Patrick





Jessel, Toby
Page, Richard (Herts SW)


Johnson-Smith, Sir Geoffrey
Parkinson, Rt Hon Cecil


Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)
Parris, Matthew


Jones, Robert (W Herts)
Patten, Christopher (Bath)


Jopling, Rt Hon Michael
Patten, John (Oxford)


Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Pawsey, James


Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth


Kershaw, Sir Anthony
Percival, Rt Hon Sir Ian


Key, Robert
Pink, R. Bonner


King, Roger (B'ham N'field)
Pollock, Alexander


King, Rt Hon Tom
Porter, Barry


Knight, Gregory (Derby N)
Powell, William (Corby)


Knight, Mrs Jill (Edgbaston)
Powley, John


Knowles, Michael
Prentice, Rt Hon Reg


Knox, David
Price, Sir David


Lamont, Norman
Prior, Rt Hon James


Lang, Ian
Proctor, K. Harvey


Latham, Michael
Pym, Rt Hon Francis



Lawler, Geoffrey
Raffan, Keith


Lawrence, Ivan
Rathbone, Tim


Lawson, Rt Hon Nigel
Rees, Rt Hon Peter (Dover)


Leigh, Edward (Gainsbor'gh)
Renton, Tim


Lennox-Boyd, Hon Mark
Rhodes James, Robert


Lester, Jim
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Lewis, Sir Kenneth (Stamf'd)
Ridley, Rt Hon Nicholas


Lightbown, David
Ridsdale, Sir Julian


Lilley, Peter
Rifkind, Malcolm


Lloyd, Ian (Havant)
Rippon, Rt Hon Geoffrey


Lloyd, Peter, (Fareham)
Roberts, Wyn (Conwy)


Lord, Michael
Robinson, Mark (N'port W)


Luce, Richard
Roe, Mrs Marion


McCrindle, Robert
Rossi, Sir Hugh


McCurley, Mrs Anna
Rost, Peter


MacGregor, John
Rowe, Andrew


MacKay, Andrew (Berkshire)
Rumbold, Mrs Angela


MacKay, John (Argyll &amp; Bute)
Ryder, Richard


Maclean, David John.
Sackville, Hon Thomas


Macmillan, Rt Hon M.
Sainsbury, Hon Timothy


McNair-Wilson, M. (N'bury)
Sayeed, Jonathan


McNair-Wilson, P. (New F'st)
Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)


McQuarrie, Albert
Shaw, Sir Michael (Scarb')


Madel, David
Shelton, William (Streatham)


Major, John
Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)


Malins, Humfrey
Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)


Malone, Gerald
Silvester, Fred


Maples, John
Sims, Roger


Marland, Paul
Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)


Marlow, Antony
Soames, Hon Nicholas


Marshall, Michael (Arundel)
Speed, Keith


Mates, Michael
Speller, Tony


Maude, Francis
Spence, John


Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
Spencer, D.



Mayhew, Sir Patrick
Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)


Merchant, Piers
Squire, Robin


Miller, Hal (B'grove)
Stanbrook, Ivor


Mills, Iain (Meriden)
Steen, Anthony


Mills, Sir Peter (West Devon)
Stern, Michael


Miscampbell, Norman
Stevens, Martin (Fulham)


Mitchell, David (NW Hants)
Stewart, Allan (Eastwood)


Moate, Roger
Stewart, Andrew (Sherwood)


Monro, Sir Hector
Stewart, Ian (N Hertf'dshire)


Montgomery, Fergus
Stokes, John


Moore, John
Stradling Thomas, J.


Morris, M. (N'hampton, S)
Sumberg, David


Morrison, Hon C. (Devizes)
Tapsell, Peter


Moynihan, Hon C.
Taylor, John (Solihull)


Mudd, David
Tebbit, Rt Hon Norman


Murphy, Christopher
Temple-Morris, Peter


Neale, Gerrard
Terlezki, Stefan


Needham, Richard
Thomas, Rt Hon Peter


Nelson, Anthony
Thompson, Donald (Calder V)


Neubert, Michael
Thompson, Patrick (N'ich N)


Nicholls, Patrick
Thorne, Neil (llford S)


Norris, Steven
Thornton, Malcolm


Onslow, Cranley
Thurnham, Peter


Oppenheim, Philip
Townend, John (Bridlington)


Oppenheim, Rt Hon Mrs S,
Townsend, Cyril D. (B'heath)


Osborn, Sir John
Tracey, Richard


Ottaway, Richard
Trippier, David


Page, John (Harrow W)
Twinn, Dr Ian






Vaughan, Dr Gerard
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Viggers, Peter
Whitfield, John


Waddington, David
Whitney, Raymond


Wakeham, Rt Hon John
Wiggin, Jerry


Waldegrave, Hon William
Winterton, Mrs Ann


Walden, George
Winterton, Nicholas


Walker, Rt Hon P. (W'cester)
Wolfson, Mark


Wall, Sir Patrick
Wood, Timothy


Waller, Gary
Woodcock, Michael


Walters, Dennis
Young, Sir George (Acton)


Ward, John
Younger, Rt Hon George


Wardle, C. (Bexhill)



Watson, John
Tellers for the Noes:


Watts, John
Mr. Carol Mather, and Mr. Robert Boscawen.


Wells, Bowen (Hertford)

Question accordingly negatived.

Question put, That the proposed words be there added:

The House divided: Ayes 343, Noes 198

Division No. 77]
[10.15 pm


AYES


Aitken, Jonathan
Clark, Sir W. (Croydon S)


Alexander, Richard
Clarke Kenneth (Rushcliffe)


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Clegg, Sir Walter


Amess, David
Cockeram, Eric


Ancram, Michael
Colvin, Michael


Arnold, Tom
Conway, Derek


Ashby, David
Coombs, Simon


Aspinwall, Jack
Cope, John


Atkins, Rt Hon Sir H.
Cormack, Patrick


Atkins, Robert (South Ribble)
Couchman, James


Atkinson. David (B'm'th E)
Critchley, Julian


Baker, Kenneth (Mole Valley)
Crouch, David


Baker, Nicholas (N Dorset)
Dickens, Geoffrey


Baldry, Anthony
Dicks, T.


Banks, Robert (Harrogate)
Dorrell, Stephen


Batiste, Spencer
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord J.


Beaumont-Dark, Anthony
Dover, Denshore


Bellingham, Henry
du Cann, Rt Hon Edward


Bendall, Vivian
Dunn, Robert


Benyon, William
Durant, Tony


Berry, Sir Anthony
Dykes, Hugh


Best, Keith
Edwards, Rt Hon N. (P'broke)


Bevan, David Gilroy
Eggar, Tim


Biffen, Rt Hon John
Emery, Sir Peter


Biggs-Davison, Sir John
Evennett, David


Blaker, Rt Hon Sir Peter
Eyre, Reginald


Body, Richard
Fairbairn, Nicholas


Bonsor, Sir Nicholas
Fallon, Michael


Bottomley, Peter
Favell, Anthony


Bowden, A. (Brighton K'to'n)
Fenner, Mrs Peggy


Boyson, Dr Rhodes
Finsberg, Geoffrey


Braine, Sir Bernard
Fletcher, Alexander


Brandon-Bravo, Martin
Fookes, Miss Janet


Bright, Graham
Forman, Nigel


Brinton, Tim
Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)


Brittan, Rt Hon Leon
Forth, Eric


Brooke, Hon Peter
Fowler, Rt Hon Norman


Brown, M. (Brigg &amp; Cl'thpes)
Fox, Marcus


Browne, John
Franks, Cecil


Bruinvels, Peter
Fraser, Peter (Angus East)


Bryan, Sir Paul
Freeman, Roger


Buchanan-Smith, Rt Hon A.
Fry, Peter


Buck, Sir Antony
Gale, Roger


Budgen, Nick
Galley, Roy


Bulmer, Esmond
Gardiner, George (Reigate)


Burt, Alistair
Gardner, Sir Edward (Fylde)


Butcher, John
Garel-Jones, Tristan


Butler, Hon Adam
Gilmour, Rt Hon Sir Ian


Butterfill, John
Glyn, Dr Alan


Carlisle, John (N Luton)
Goodhart, Sir Philip


Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)
Goodlad, Alastair


Carttiss, Michael
Gorst, John



Chapman, Sydney
Gow, Ian


Chope, Christopher
Gower, Sir Raymond


Churchill, W. S.
Greenway, Harry


Clark, Hon A. (Plym'th S'n)
Gregory, Conal


Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)
Griffiths, E. (B'y St Edm'ds)





Griffiths, Peter (Portsm'th N)
Maclean, David John.


Grist, Ian
Macmillan, Rt Hon M.


Ground, Patrick
McNair-Wilson, M. (N'bury)


Grylls, Michael
McNair-Wilson, P. (New F'st)


Hamilton, Hon A. (Epsom)
McQuarrie, Albert


Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)
Madel, David


Hampson, Dr Keith
Major, John


Hanley, Jeremy
Malins, Humfrey


Hannam, John
Malone, Gerald


Hargreaves, Kenneth
Maples, John


Harris, David
Marland, Paul


Harvey, Robert
Marlow, Antony


Haselhurst, Alan
Marshall, Michael (Arundel)


Havers, Rt Hon Sir Michael
Mates, Michael


Hawksley, Warren
Maude, Francis


Hayes, J.
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin


Hayhoe, Barney
Mayhew, Sir Patrick


Hayward, Robert
Merchant, Piers


Heathcoat-Amory, David
Miller, Hal (B'grove)


Heddle, John
Mills, Iain (Meriden)


Henderson, Barry
Mills, Sir Peter (West Devon)


Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael
Miscampbell, Norman


Hickmet, Richard
Mitchell, David (NW Hants)


Higgins, Rt Hon Terence L.
Moate, Roger


Hind, Kenneth
Monro, Sir Hector


Hirst, Michael
Montgomery, Fergus


Hogg, Hon Douglas (Gr'th'm)
Moore, John


Holland, Sir Philip (Gedling)
Morris, M. (N'hampton, S)


Holt, Richard
Morrison, Hon C. (Devizes)


Hooson, Tom
Moynihan, Hon C.


Hordern, Peter
Mudd, David


Howard, Michael
Murphy, Christopher


Howarth, Alan (Stratf'd-on-A)
Neale, Gerrard


Howarth, Gerald (Cannock)
Needham, Richard


Howell, Rt Hon D. (G'ldford)
Nelson, Anthony


Howell, Ralph (N Norfolk)
Neubert, Michael


Hubbard-Miles, Peter
Nicholls, Patrick


Hunt, David (Wirral)
Norris, Steven


Hunt, John (Ravensbourne)
Onslow, Cranley


Hunter, Andrew
Oppenheim, Rt Hon Mrs S.


Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas
Osborn, Sir John


Irving, Charles
Ottaway, Richard


Jackson, Robert
Page, John (Harrow W)


Jenkin, Rt Hon Patrick
Page, Richard (Herts SW)


Jessel, Toby
Parkinson, Rt Hon Cecil


Johnson-Smith, Sir Geoffrey
Parris, Matthew


Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)
Patten, Christopher (Bath)


Jones, Robert (W Herts)
Patten, John (Oxford)


Jopling, Rt Hon Michael
Pawsey, James


Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth


Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Percival, Rt Hon Sir Ian


Kershaw, Sir Anthony
Pink, R. Bonner


Key, Robert
Pollock, Alexander


King, Roger (B'ham N'field)
Porter, Barry


King, Rt Hon Tom
Powell, William (Corby)


Knight, Gregory (Derby N)
Powley, John


Knight, Mrs Jill (Edgbaston)
Prentice, Rt Hon Reg


Knowles, Michael
Price, Sir David


Knox, David
Prior, Rt Hon James


Lamont, Norman
Proctor, K. Harvey


Lang, Ian
Pym, Rt Hon Francis


Latham, Michael
Raffan, Keith


Lawler, Geoffrey
Rathbone, Tim


Lawrence, Ivan
Rees, Rt Hon Peter (Dover)


Lawson, Rt Hon Nigel
Renton, Tim


Leigh, Edward (Gainsbor'gh)
Rhodes James, Robert


Lennox-Boyd, Hon Mark
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Lester, Jim
Ridley, Rt Hon Nicholas


Lewis, Sir Kenneth (Stamf'd)
Ridsdale, Sir Julian


Lightbown, David
Rifkind, Malcolm


Lilley, Peter
Rippon, Rt Hon Geoffrey


Lloyd, Ian (Havant)
Roberts, Wyn (Conwy)


Lloyd, Peter, (Fareham)
Robinson, Mark (N'port W)


Lord, Michael
Roe, Mrs Marion


Luce, Richard
Rossi, Sir Hugh


McCrindle, Robert
Rost, Peter


McCurley, Mrs Anna
Rowe, Andrew


MacGregor, John
Rumbold, Mrs Angela


MacKay, Andrew (Berkshire)
Ryder, Richard


MacKay, John (Argyll &amp; Bute)
Sackville, Hon Thomas






Sainsbury, Hon Timothy
Thurnham, Peter


Sayeed, Jonathan
Townend, John (Bridlington)


Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)
Townsend, Cyril D. (B'heath)


Shaw, Sir Michael (Scarb')
Tracey, Richard


Shelton, William (Streatham)
Trippier, David


Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)
Twinn, Dr Ian


Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)
Vaughan, Dr Gerard


Silvester, Fred
Viggers, Peter


Sims, Roger
Waddington, David


Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)
Wakeham, Rt Hon John


Soames, Hon Nicholas
Waldegrave, Hon William


Speed, Keith
Walden, George


Speller, Tony
Walker, Rt Hon P. (W'cester)


Spence, John
Wall, Sir Patrick


Spencer, D.
Waller, Gary


Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)
Walters, Dennis


Squire, Robin
Ward, John


Stanbrook, Ivor
Wardle, C. (Bexhill)


Steen, Anthony
Warren, Kenneth


Stern, Michael
Watson, John


Stevens, Martin (Fulham)
Watts, John


Stewart, Allan (Eastwood)
Wells, Bowen (Hertford)


Stewart, Andrew (Sherwood)
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Stewart, Ian (N Hertf'dshire)
Whitfield, John


Stokes, John
Whitney, Raymond


Stradling Thomas, J.
Winterton, Mrs Ann


Sumberg, David
Winterton, Nicholas


Tapsell, Peter
Wolfson, Mark


Taylor, John (Solihull)
Wood, Timothy


Tebbit, Rt Hon Norman
Woodcock, Michael


Temple-Morris, Peter
Young, Sir George (Acton)


Terlezki, Stefan
Younger, Rt Hon George


Thomas, Rt Hon Peter



Thompson, Donald (Calder V)
Tellers for the Ayes:


Thompson, Patrick (N'ich N)
Mr. Carol Mather and Mr. Robert Boscawen.


Thorne, Neil (Ilford S)



Thornton, Malcolm





NOES


Abse, Leo
Cook, Frank (Stockton North)


Adams, Allen (Paisley N)
Cook, Robin F. (Livingston)


Alton, David
Corbett, Robin


Anderson, Donald
Corbyn, Jeremy


Archer, Rt Hon Peter
Cowans, Harry


Ashdown, Paddy
Craigen, J. M.


Ashley, Rt Hon Jack
Crowther, Stan


Ashton, Joe
Cunningham, Dr John


Atkinson, N. (Tottenham)
Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (L'lli)


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Davies, Ronald (Caerphilly)


Banks, Tony (Newham NW)
Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'ge H'l)


Barnett, Guy
Deakins, Eric


Barron, Kevin
Dobson, Frank


Beckett, Mrs Margaret
Dormand, Jack


Beith, A. J.
Douglas, Dick


Bell, Stuart
Dubs, Alfred


Bennett, A. (Dent'n &amp; Red'sh)
Duffy, A. E. P.


Bermingham, Gerald
Eadie, Alex


Bidwell, Sydney
Eastham, Ken


Blair, Anthony
Ellis, Raymond


Boothroyd, Miss Betty
Evans, Ioan (Cynon Valley)


Boyes, Roland
Evans, John (St. Helens N)


Brown, Gordon (D'f'mline E)
Ewing, Harry


Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)
Fatchett, Derek


Brown, N. (N'c'tle-u-Tyne E)
Faulds, Andrew


Brown, R. (N'c'tle-u-Tyne N)
Field, Frank (Birkenhead)


Brown, Ron (E'burgh, Leith)
Fields, T. (L'pool Broad Gn)


Caborn, Richard
Fisher, Mark


Callaghan, Jim (Heyw'd &amp; M)
Flannery, Martin


Campbell, Ian
Forrester, John


Canavan, Dennis
Foster, Derek


Carlile, Alexander (Montg'y)
Foulkes, George


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Fraser, J. (Norwood)


Cartwright, John
Freeson, Rt Hon Reginald


Clark, Dr David (S Shields)
Freud, Clement


Clay, Robert
Garrett, W. E.


Cocks, Rt Hon M. (Bristol S.)
Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John


Cohen, Harry
Godman, Dr Norman


Coleman, Donald
Golding, John


Concannon, Rt Hon J. D.
Gould, Bryan


Conlan, Bernard
Hamilton, James (M'well N)





Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Park, George


Harman, Ms Harriet
Parry, Robert


Harrison, Rt Hon Walter
Patchett, Terry


Hart, Rt Hon Dame Judith
Pendry, Tom


Healey, Rt Hon Denis
Penhaligon, David


Heffer, Eric S.
Pike, Peter


Hogg, N. (C'nauld &amp; Kilsyth)
Powell, Raymond (Ogmore)


Holland, Stuart (Vauxhall)
Prescott, John


Home Robertson, John
Radice, Giles


Howells, Geraint
Randall, Stuart


Hoyle, Douglas
Redmond, M.


Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Richardson, Ms Jo


Hughes, Roy (Newport East)
Roberts, Ernest (Hackney N)


Hughes, Sean (Knowsley S)
Robertson, George


Hughes, Simon (Southwark)
Robinson, G. (Coventry NW)


Janner, Hon Greville
Rogers, Allan


Jenkins, Rt Hon Roy (Hillh'd)
Rooker, J. W.


John, Brynmor
Ross, Ernest (Dundee W)


Jones, Barry (Alyn &amp; Deeside)
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald
Rowlands, Ted


Kennedy, Charles
Ryman, John


Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Sedgemore, Brian


Kirkwood, Archibald
Sheerman, Barry


Lamond, James
Sheldon, Rt Hon R.


Lead bitter, Ted
Shore, Rt Hon Peter


Leighton, Ronald
Short, Ms Clare (Ladywood)


Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Short, Mrs R.(W'hampt'n NE)


Lewis, Terence (Worsley)
Silkin, Rt Hon J.


Litherland, Robert
Skinner, Dennis


Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)
Smith, C.(Isl'ton S &amp; F'bury)


Lofthouse, Geoffrey
Smith, Rt Hon J. (M'kl'ds E)


Loyden, Edward
Soley, Clive


McCartney, Hugh
Spearing, Nigel


McDonald, Dr Oonagh
Steel, Rt Hon David


McGuire, Michael
Stewart, Rt Hon D. (W Isles)


McKay, Allen (Penistone)
Stott, Roger


McKelvey, William
Straw, Jack


Mackenzie, Rt Hon Gregor
Thomas, Dafydd (Merioneth)


McNamara, Kevin
Thomas, Dr R. (Carmarthen)


McTaggart, Robert
Thompson, J. (Wansbeck)


McWilliam, John
Thorne, Stan (Preston)


Madden, Max
Tinn, James


Marek, Dr John
Torney, Tom



Marshall, David (Shettleston)
Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.


Martin, Michael
Wainwright, R.


Mason, Rt Hon Roy
Wallace, James


Maxton, John
Wardell, Gareth (Gower)


Maynard, Miss Joan
Wareing, Robert


Meacher, Michael
Weetch, Ken


Meadowcroft, Michael
Welsh, Michael


Michie, William
White, James


Millan, Rt Hon Bruce
Wigley, Dafydd


Miller, DrM. S. (E Kilbride)
Williams, Rt Hon A.


Mitchell, Austin (G't Grimsby)
Winnick, David


Morris, Rt Hon A. (W'shawe)
Woodall, Alec


Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)
Young, David (Bolton SE)


Nellist, David



Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon
Tellers for the Noes:


O'Brien, William
Mr. Frank Haynes and Mr. Don Dixon.


O'Neill, Martin

Question accordingly agreed to.

MR. SPEAKER forthwith declared the main Question, as amended, to be agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House congratulates Her Majesty's Government for successive increases in retirement pensions which have increased the purchasing power of nine million pensioners since 1978–79; recognises the success of this Government's economic policies in reducing and controlling inflation; and notes that the greatest single threat to the security, savings, and hiving standards of pensioners would be the reversal of these policies.

European Community (Hazardous Wastes)

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. William Waldegrave): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 4342/83, Proposal for a Council Directive on the Supervision and Control of Transfrontier Shipment of Hazardous Wastes Within the European Community, and 8124/83, Proposal for a Council Regulation on the Supervision and Control of Transfrontier Shipment of Hazardous Wastes Within the European Community; and supports the European Community's efforts to improve control over the transfrontier shipment of hazardous wastes.
This proposal for a European Community instrument for the supervision and control of transfrontier shipment of hazardous waste both complements and enhances the controls that the United Kingdom already operates over shipments of hazardous waste across our frontiers as well as introducing additional safeguards on the movement of hazardous recyclable materials. It should significantly improve controls over shipments across frontiers throughout the European community. It is not concerned with radioactive waste.
In January this year the European Commission submitted a proposal to the Council in the form of a directive. That was document No. COM(82)892 or 4342/83, which required the producer or consignor of hazardous wastes to notify "competent authorities" of member states that a shipment was intended, any objections to be stated by the "competent authority" and to be resolved, and the shipment to be accompanied by a consignment note during transit, which would identify the origin and destination of the waste, its essential characteristics and indicate the action to be taken in case of emergency. Finally, the disposer of the hazardous waste would be required to certify that he had received the waste described on the consignment note. The system therefore provides a positive form of control over transfrontier shipments of hazardous waste from the "cradle to the grave". The Government have welcomed the basis of the Commission's proposal.

Mr. Tony Marlow: What is the volume and value of this waste that is passing across United Kingdom frontiers into other Community countries? What would be the likely cost to those people of moving such wastes, and what would be the increase in bureaucracy, the Civil Service and Government costs involved in it? Perhaps my hon. Friend will be coming to that later.

Mr. Waldegrave: Almost no hazardous waste is exported from Britain. About 5,000 tonnes a year—mostly from Sweden—is imported into specialised facilities in Britain. Those wastes, by definition, have a negative value. It costs money to get rid of them. The value of the recyclable waste—which is mostly nonferrous metals but includes some chemicals, which have a positive value and which are re-used after being recycled in specialised facilities—is about £250 million a year. However, I shall write to my hon. Friend if that figure is wrong.
I recognise that this is a matter of considerable concern to hon. Members, and I am grateful to the Select Committee on European Legislation for the interest that it

has shown and in particular for the two helpful reports it has produced on the Commission's proposals. I should also mention the valuable work done on the same subject in another place, amd the report resulting from it which was published last week.
In June, the Commission amended its original proposal in the light of the opinions of the European Parliament and the Economic and Social Committee, which called for a regulation. This was the form of the revised proposal—document No. COM(83)386 or 8124/83—which has superseded the original draft directive. With the House's agreement, I would therefore suggest that we confine our debate this evening to the contents of the latest proposal, the draft regulation.
The reports that I mentioned criticised several of the provisions contained in the Commission's revised proposal. It is widely recognised that there is a need for a Community-wide common system of control over transfrontier shipment of hazardous wastes. This was dramatically illustrated earlier this year when a consignment of highly toxic waste, dioxin, from northern Italy went missing, only to be discovered later in a disused abattior in France. That incident called into question the degree to which some member states had honoured their obligations under existing community waste legislation, especially the 1978 directive on toxic and dangerous waste. Recognising the need for urgent action, Ministers at the Environment Council in Luxembourg in June which I attended, called for rapid agreement on a legally binding Community instrument covering transhipment, at the latest by the end of the year.
I cannot, of course, pre-judge the outcome of the meeting of the Council of Environment Ministers, which I shall be attending next Monday, but I am pleased to say that, on the whole, discussions have in general proceeded towards a more simplified proposal than the Commission's draft regulation. Perhaps it would therefore be helpful to the House at this stage if I briefly outlined the scope of the draft regulation. The documentary control system envisaged in the original directive is retained, albeit with some modifications, and is supplemented by some additional requirements, such as the use of special routes for shipments, the designation of border crossing points, and producer liability.
There have been extensive discussions in Brussels at official level on all the new provisions, and the Government have not been alone in expressing their concern that the supplementary provisions were not essential to the basic system of pre-notification and documentary control, and could jeopardise early agreement on the instrument as a whole.
I shall concentrate on the fundamental provisions which are at the core of the proposal, although I shall be happy to respond to points that hon. Members may make about the supplementary provisions during the debate. For this reason also, I shall not spend much of the limited time we have available this evening discussing the legal form of the proposed instrument—whether it would be a directive or a regulation. A regulation would set something of a precedent in the environmental area, although a directive is just as legally binding on member states. What matters more is the scope and content of the proposal itself, although I shall take careful note of the preference expressed by the report from another place for a directive, and of the views expressed this evening.
My Department's latest supplementary memorandum provides the details of the amended test. The core consists of article 1, which deals with objectives, and article 2 with definitions of hazardous waste.
Article 3 deals with the pre-notification arrangements which enable competent authorities to check that proper contractual arrangements exist for the disposal of the waste and that the wastes are to be disposed of at a properly licensed site, as well as providing the necessary details about the nature of the wastes and where they originate from. A standard form is provided for.
Article 4 requires the competent authority to acknowledge the notification within four weeks. This is perhaps one of the most important articles in the whole proposal. The Government favour a control system which, while preventing a transfrontier shipment being initiated before the competent authority of the country of destination has satisfied itself that adequate disposal facilities exist in the member state, places a requirement on the competent authorities to process the notification form in a reasonable period of time—four weeks—and, as provided for in article 5, to state the legal justification for objections to the proposed shipment.
Once this process has been completed the shipment can proceed, accompanied by a copy of the acknowledgement from the competent authority and the consignment note, copies of which must also be sent to the competent authority as required in article 7. The waste disposer must certify that he has received the wastes and notify the competent authorities accordingly. Thus, all the competent authorities will have received advanced notice that a shipment is intended, will be aware that it is in progress and will be notified that it has arrived at its intended destination.
Article 3 provides for season ticket arrangements for regular shipments of waste—a new article covers materials for recycling, which I should like to deal with separately—and article 9 deals with exports to outside the Community. There are also provisions for the introduction of appropriate penalties for infringement of the requirements of the instrument, and for providing information to the Commission. The rest of the articles of the revised proposal concern issues which the Government considers supplementary to the essential objectives of the instrument.
The United Kingdom's existing system of controls over disposal of hazardous wastes is both compatible with and strengthened by this proposal. Particularly difficult wastes, known as special wastes, are already subject to a pre-notification and consignment note system under the Special Wastes Regulations 1980, and such wastes have to be disposed of at a site licensed to take them under part I of the Control of Pollution Act 1974. The regulations already apply to imports and exports of special waste, but the Commission's proposals would give the United Kingdom competent authorities—that is, our waste disposal authorities—greater advance warning that a shipment was planned. It would also enable them to satisfy themselves that any waste exported out of the United Kingdom had been properly disposed of, although I should say that, to my Department's knowledge, such exports of waste, as I said to my hon. Friend, are at present minimal.
Perhaps it is as well to recognise at this point that the proposal has far greater relevance to our other EC colleagues in mainland Europe, whose land borders mean that much more crosses their frontiers. The proposal,

therefore, has to recognise those countries' own particular circumstances as much as ours. That is reflected in the degree of involvement of transit countries in the documentary control system, something that the United Kingdom would prefer to minimise, as it has little transit traffic, but which a number of other countries in Europe are rightly concerned about because of the volume of traffic crossing their frontiers.

Mr. Marlow: My hon. Friend has just said that this directive would strengthen the system that we have in this country. Is the system that we have at the moment not adequate, or are we being forced into yet further bureaucratic measures that we would not of our own volition introduce?

Mr. Waldegrave: I believe that this is an improvement on our existing controls. What is more, quite apart from the European Community, we have various international agreements and regulations dealing with the transporters—the tankers, and so forth—in which chemical waste is transported. That shows that, apart from the European Community, we have always recognised that in such circumstances we have to deal with friends and neighbours to get a sensible regime. Measures of this nature are appropriate for the Community. It is an example of how the European Community can produce sensible results for our citizens.
In addition, other member states do not at present have the type of pre-notification system for difficult wastes which already operates in the United Kingdom. It is a case where perhaps the higher standards and the more sensible system that exist in the United Kingdom have been adopted in the European Community. That is beneficial to us in maintaining our practices, and sensible for the rest of the Community. I think it would be fair to say that the Commission proposal is, in fact, based on existing United Kingdom practice.
I would now like to return to the subject of those hazardous materials which cross frontiers and which are intended for recycling. Hon. Members will know from the memoranda submitted by my Department that the Government remain unconvinced that recyclable materials should be subject to the type of control system envisaged for hazardous wastes.
Recyclable materials are the object of normal commercial trading practices in the same sense as other comparable raw materials with which they compete. They are valuable to their owners and so are much less likely to "disappear" than hazardous wastes going for disposal. The recycling industry is highly vulnerable to changing market pressures, so a delay of four weeks could be very costly and might in some cases mean that disposal rather than recycling takes place.
It is firm Community policy to encourage recycling on environmental grounds. We do not want to damage what is a sensible trade in environmental terms. To force each individual country to invest in what is sometimes expensive capital plant for recycling would be the absolute negation of sensible Community policy. However, I understand the view that exclusion of recyclables might provide a significant loophole in the controls. There have been one or two incidents in the past which could lead one to believe that that might happen.
We have therefore proposed a simplified control system for hazardous recyclable material, and this proposal


appears to be attracting substantial interest among our Community partners. no pre-notification would be required, but the person sending the waste across a frontier would still have to use the same consignment note form that is used for wastes intended for disposal. He would be required to sign a declaration on this form that the waste was intended for recycling, and send it, in advance of the shipment, to the competent authority in the country of destination. A copy of the consignment note would, of course, travel with the shipment. The person receiving the material for recycling would also have to sign a declaration to the effect that he had received it for recycling, and forward his copy of the consignment note to the same competent authority.
There would still be a "closed loop" of information in the country of destination, allowing the authorities to check up on the shipment if they wished. Such a system also avoides the delay inherent in the full control system envisaged for wastes for disposal. This is a compromise arrangement which seeks to meet the views of some other member states while recognising that it would be impracticable to treat recyclable hazardous materials in the same way as hazardous wastes intended for disposal.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton: During his excellent exposition, my hon. Friend has repeatedly referred to "states". Will he refer to the chemical industry, which is inevitably intimately involved in this matter, and tell the House what representations he has received from the Chemical Industries Association and individual companies, because they are rather more interested than the states? Their views, rather than those of the member states of the Community, are more important to me in deciding whether these are good regulations.

Mr. Waldegrave: I am happy to give that information. Governments and industry have a legitimate interest because it is the duty of Governments to ensure that hazardous products do not cause avoidable dangers to their citizens. Industry has a legitimate interest in seeing that the control systems that the Government introduce are not unnecessarily complicated and bureaucratic. Although the Chemical Industries Association, with which I have discussed the matter, and the CBI are anxious, as are the Government, that we should stick to the "core" proposals without decorating them unnecessarily with additions, they believe that the system is workable and have not objected to it. I think that I can set my hon. Friend's mind at rest on that point.
The rest of the provisions of the Commission's draft regulation cover a wide range of issues which are related, but in our view not essential, to the basic control system. These include objections by transit countries—article 5 the use of designated routes and border crossings—articles 8 and 14—licensing and training of transporters article 13—insurance cover—article 11—and strict liability of producers until the waste is disposed of—article 15.
The last of these, in particular, is unacceptable to the Government. We recognise that there may be a problem in that different member states have different laws on the liability of the producer and that the contrasts between these will be highlighted where transfrontier shipments are involved.
Our legal system recognises that the producer of a waste has a moral responsibility for it throughout its shipment and disposal, but that the transporter, disposer, and any others involved share this as well. The Commission's proposal would therefore be at odds with United Kingdom law in this area.

Mr. Hugh Dykes: Articles 11 and 13 of the draft regulation refer to this matter obliquely. Does my hon. Friend agree that, while this may not be a problem with the domestic internal transport of waste, for cross-frontier transportation there should be more guidance in the articles and in the regulation about the quality, strength and dimensions of the containers? Labelling is not enough. That would have the twofold purpose of helping the authorities, including the Community authorities, if they wished to pursue those who were infringing the regulations, and giving guidance to those connected with the transportation exercise?

Mr. Waldegrave: The Hazchem warning labels on transporters and, indeed, the requirement that tanker drivers, although not all other hazardous goods vehicle drivers, must carry certificates showing that they have been properly trained, are at present maintained under one of the other treaties to which I referred previously, not under an EC regulation. It is an important area in which negotiations continue between the British Government and the industry. I do not rule out the EC having a role in that in future. At present, however, I would not want to delay the chance of getting this directive agreed relatively quickly by seeking to widen its scope in that direction. Therefore, it is the Government's view that on this occasion we should try to concentrate on the basic core of consignment note and notification systems and get that agreed.
At the same time, as this legal issue goes much wider than transfrontier shipments of hazardous waste, the Government think that it should be tackled by the Community in a broader context. It is in fact already under detailed discussion by our consumer affairs colleagues.
The Government welcome the basis of the Commission's proposals. I hope that we shall be able to reach agreement on the early introduction of the basic documentary control system when I attend the Council of Environment Ministers in Brussels next week.

Dr. David Clark: We welcome the opportunity to participate in this debate and to be able to express our views to the Government. I know that the Minister will take on board our views and represent some of them to his colleagues in Europe next week.
I welcome the debate in a personal sense because I represent a town that is also a port which has had considerable problems with the storage of hazardous material. It is good that we should be debating this issue. Ever since I became a Member of the House in 1970, I seem to have been fighting alongside the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Griffiths), arguing for stronger and tighter legislation for the storage and disposal of waste. I am pleased to say that I think we have tightened things up considerably over the past 13 years and the documents before us tonight is a step in the process of making our society and people safer from chemical and other hazardous processes.
The hazardous waste that we discussed 10 or 12 years ago was domestic, but with the growth of modern technology the hazardous waste industry now recognises no international barriers. For example, nuclear waste comes all the way from Japan to this country to be reprocessed. The EC has a valuable role to play in this respect and it is right that we should be working together to achieve common standards and practices.
There are a few points that I am sure the Minister was expecting me to raise because certain matters need clarifying and we have some doubts about the Government's reaction to the proposals before the House. I pay tribute to my MEP for South Tyne and Wear, Joyce Quin, who worked closely with me in prodding the Commission into trying to persuade the European Parliament to produce the directive that is now before us. Indeed, It was the answer to one of her questions, on 4 May 1983, that elicited the information that only three EC states—West Germany, Luxembourg and the United Kingdom—had complied with the obligation regarding the report on the disposal of toxic and dangerous waste pursuant to article 16 of directive 78/319. I hope that the Minister will follow that up because the Community sets these standards and it should not be just three states that support them.

Mr. Waldegrave: I strongly agree with the hon. Gentleman, in respect of not only this directive but a number of others. One sometimes has the feeling that we legislate in Europe and that some countries are more serious than others about the enforcement that should follow.

Dr. Clark: I am grateful for the Minister's reassurance on that point. Different countries have different standards of definition and I gather that our definition will be the key one covering imported material.

Mr. Waldegrave: indicated assent.

Dr. Clark: I am glad that the Minister acknowledges that. It is right that our standards should be those to which we adhere and not the standards of the country sending the material.
Some waste disposal authorities take my view—although I recognise that the CBI and other interested bodies take another line, as the Minister outlined—on the question of waste for recycling. I was partly reassured by the Minister's explanation; he explained the position more clearly than a reading of the documents provides. I am still worried because, as he remarked, this is a volatile industry in every respect and time is of the essence. I am worried lest we have some hazardous waste imported into Britain with the intention of recyling it but for some reason—because of a change in the market or because exchange values alter—it is considered not worthwhile to conduct the reprocessing.
There might be a loophole in that connection and I will explain my fear as a result of experience in my constituency, for not only the interest of industry is involved. We are all interested in industry, jobs and modern technology, but we must be equally interested in public safety, and in that respect there are problems for some local authorities in planning matters.
With my constituency being at the very mouth of the Tyne, facing Europe, we have at least one large firm connected with the storage of hazardous and other waste,

Velva Liquids, which has a large number of storage tanks in my constituency and some across the river. In the past—I emphasise that—there have been great difficulties simply because local authorities were never sure what was in those storage tanks. Most tanks were within several hundred yards of residential development, and that caused the authorities much anxiety. The system has improved considerably of late since the Health and Safety Executive has started operating the system more effectively. In one case, the Health and Safety Executive advised the local authority not to build a junior school in the vicinity because of the proximity of the tanks. My local authority was concerned because it had been advised not to build a school, yet children were still playing around the houses and in the gardens in the area. I am worried that full notification may not be given to the local authorities.
I concede that materials imported under the regulations are covered. However, I am worried that material imported under the recycling regulations could be stored for some time, not be recycled as proposed and the local authority may not know what is in the storage tanks. I know that the Minister will examine that point.
The Minister dealt briefly with land-fill—I know that he was trying to expedite business. Many waste disposal authorities face difficulties in finding a place in which to put domestic waste. If the draft regulations are accepted could a waste disposal authority refuse waste if it were intended for land-fill? It may be that some authorities would not want the material to be used as land-fill when they already have problems in disposing of domestic waste. It would be helpful if the Minister were to answer that important point.

Mr. Eldon Griffiths: I share the hon. Gentleman's anxiety. If an authority had licensed a pit to receive toxic materials or recyclable materials, there would surely be no way of discriminating between materials coming from different places. The pit should receive the waste if it is fit to do so, no matter from where it comes.

Dr. Clark: We went through this matter in great detail when discussing the 1971 Act. There is a shortage of licensed pits in some parts of the country. Local authorities know their capabilities, and more waste could add to their problems.
The Minister said that the Government were a little worried about the transit arrangements. I take his point that perhaps we are not too worried about that in this country. I should be interested to know how much material comes into this country en route from or to the Irish Republic. Many shipments come into the Tyne, Humber and other east coast ports in huge container lorries. There may be more material in transit than we imagine. Perhaps the Government could look into that matter before Monday.
The Government are reluctant to specify entry ports. I concede that this adds to the difficulties. However, there is a great advantage in channelling hazardous wastes through ports, as Britain does, where there is expertise available and one does not need literally to have a master and a dog to deal with the sophisticated and complicated waste and documentation. I hope that the Government will not be too rigid on the specific entry points to which reference is made in the draft directive.
I wish to be slightly critical about two points. I hope that the Minister will take my criticism in the spirit in


which it is intended. Nowadays we are told of the cost and the manpower implications of every Bill. Is he satisfied that the ports have sufficient personnel to handle the increased documentation? We all welcome the tightening of the regulations, but unless they are properly checked and monitored the whole system will fail. I hope that there will be sufficient personnel to deal with them and that the Health and Safety Executive will also not suffer manpower problems. Finally, will there be any extra demands on the local authorities involved? The Minister's comments on those aspects would be most helpful?
In answer to an intervention, the Minister rightly said that, although we were dealing with this in a European context, the majority of our imports of hazardous waste were from non-EC countries. Will he undertake to press for bilateral agreements with other countries at least to comply with these regulations, if not to tighten them up?
To be parochial for a moment, my constituency faces more towards Norway than France. Scotland and the north-east have a long seaboard with the Scandinavian countries. We are conscious that the regulations cover waste oil, but not oil slicks. Material from Norway and Sweden comes into the United Kingdom, some for reprocessing and some for other reasons. I recently read an excellent paper by the Norwegians' "keep the coast tidy" organisation. I sometimes feel, however, that they are keeping their coast tidy at our expense, although they would probably reply that we are killing their lakes with acid rain. Nevertheless, I hope that the Minister will press for bilateral agreements with other countries as I understand that we import material from at least 19 countries, including some behind the iron curtain.
There is great public anxiety about these matters. We believe that the regulations are a step in the right direction. We hope that the Government will ensure that they are tightened up—not to make them unworkable, but as a first step towards even more ideal arrangements.

Mr. John Watson: I wish to ask two rather lengthy questions rather than to make a speech, but I thought that it was better to do so in this way rather than by intervening in the speech of my hon. Friend the Minister.
The potential dangers to human beings in Britain from the transport of non-nuclear waste and various hazardous chemicals seem to me to be considerably greater than those likely to arise from the transport of nuclear waste. It is therefore appropriate that we should give rather more attention to the transport of non-nuclear waste than we customarily give to the transport of nuclear waste. If we were discussing the latter, attendance in the Chamber would be far greater. In my constituency, when a consignment of waste comes along the local railway line for processing at Sellafield people wait about to take photographs of the flasks and send nasty letters to the local press, but consignments of cyanide or propane gas go through more or less unnoticed. I should have thought that the chances of an accident happening to one of those conventional consignments was rather greater. More importantly, if anything went wrong the risk to human life from such a consignment would also be considerably greater. I am therefore glad that the House is spending time in dealing with the transport of non-nuclear waste.
My first question is this. Does my hon. Friend the Minister feel generally content with the standard of regulations now operating in the United Kingdom for the broad transport of non-nuclear waste?
My second question concerns land-fill, to which the hon. Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark) referred. I understand that the regulations as drafted will not enable us to object to the import of hazardous waste simply and solely on the ground that it is to be used for land filling. It may be possible to object to the shipment on other grounds, but not simply on the grounds of land filling. I can see no logical reason why my hon. Friend the Minister should not give himself power to do so at this stage.
I know that the problem is not significant. People say that little is imported from Europe for land-fill tipping and that the cost of shipping it is so small that it will never be a problem. However, I should have thought that, as there would be no harm in giving ourselves the power to ban such shipments outright, we should give ourselves that power. Perhaps other European countries will decide to give themselves that power. The Germans may become increasingly irritated with their absorption of hazardous waste from Holland, for example. In those circumstances, if we do not watch it, we may find that we are the general dumping ground for Europe for hazardous waste of various sorts, although we have less land and fewer pits available to absorb the wast than most of our European competitors.
Therefore, will my hon. Friend carefully consider equipping himself with that power? If not, will he at least give the House an undertaking that he will keep the situation under close review to make sure that the nation's resources are not abused?

Mr. Stephen Ross: I welcome the directive, which is an important step forward. I reiterate what was said in an intervention in the Minister's speech. Labelling and packaging is important. It must be permanent and clearly identifiable. That is not necessarily so at the moment.
Local authorities, particularly county councils, are faced with increasing expenditure. I hope that the Minister will draw this matter to the attention of the Secretary of State. I am a former leader of a county council, and still am a member. Increased costs are always imposed on such authorities, and are not always made up in the rate support grant. As we are facing all sorts of penalties, I hope that any increased costs will be allowed for.
The Minister said that he was likely to visit Brussels shortly in connection with the directive and its implementation. Will it be possible to extend the provisions under article 9 to cover the carriage of dangerous chemicals and poisons that are leaving the EC for countries outside it? My constituency has suffered appallingly in recent years from the washing up on our shores of dangerous chemicals and poisons. I went to Brussels in March this year to meet a gentleman in Mr. Dalsager's office. I am afraid that I cannot remember his name. I pleaded that the EC should start to consider the matter. I am told that some preliminaries have been made in an office in Dublin, but I am not sure how far they have got.
I remind the Minister that in the past two or three years there have been two major disasters in the channel of ships going down or shedding loads—the Tozeur and the Aeolian Sky. Vast quantities of poisons such as arsenic


trichloride washed up on our shores. The problem hit not only my constituents but the whole of the south coast. It was difficult to identify those poisons. We had to get experts from Harwell and elsewhere to help us. The identification on the packages was inadequate.
Consideration of the regulations, which deal with the transportation of hazardous waste within the EC, offers us an opportunity to widen the scope and include dangerous chemicals and poisons. It is not a big step to take, and it is partly covered by article 9. I hope that that will be taken on board, together with the claims that local authorities then make for the damage and expense they incur in clearing up their beaches and getting these chemicals restored and properly dealt with. Our figure is about £35,000, but I realise that other authorities within the United Kingdom are faced with far higher sums. I know that the House is not talking about oil, but I believe Norfolk has a claim of about £5 million outstanding.
The owners of ships that discharge cargoes or go down always seem to be registered in some obscure country and cannot be brought to book. That is a difficulty. One hopes for help from the Department of Trade. No doubt the Department helps, but local authorities generally finish up shouldering the entire cost.
Therefore, my plea is for the extension of the role of these directives and regulations so that a common approach can be looked for within the EEC to a growing problem. This is particularly so in the English channel where there is a far more lackadaisical approach. Systems of transporting chemicals and fertilisers can cause great trouble to areas which look too much to the tourist industry for their income. Although many of these cargoes are lashed on board ships, I gather that some have to be put on deck. When a ship gets into trouble, these cargoes are the first to be offloaded and come up on to our beaches. If any help can be given on that matter, I shall be grateful.
I very much welcome the proposed directives.

Mr. Eldon Griffiths: I welcome the general drift of the proposed regulations and the explanation that my hon. Friend the Minister so lucidly gave to the House. It is a particular pleasure to follow the hon. Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark), for, as he said, we have from time to time debated these matters in the past.
I have some interest in this matter. I suppose I was the author, in this House at least, of the arrangements whereby we require people to notify the disposal authorities when they get toxic and hazardous waste off their premises. Similarly, we require that the loop be closed by the receiving authority indicating that it has received it and disposed of it. I am delighted that this system which was probably initiated in the United Kingdom has now, in a sense, been Europeanised.
I welcome the document also because it is a further step down the road towards creating a genuinely Common Market. There must be within the European Community a certain division of labour and specialisation of function. If some countries have the facilities for disposing of particularly complex wastes in an intelligent fashion, it makes sense that those facilities should not be duplicated in every part of the Community but should be used wherever they are best available. That is why the transfrontier movement of waste is an inherent part of the concept of a common market that I welcome.
From some modest experience, I can say that nothing alarms people so much as merely talking about toxic or hazardous wastes. It is rather like the word "nuclear", which alarms people. Therefore, I welcome the regulations because we are providing a sensible system that can meet the alarm that people genuinely feel from time to time.
The hon. Member for the Isle of Wight (Mr. Ross) spoke of the risks of ships offloading hazardous cargo in difficult circumstances. I remember going down to Cornwall when we were told that barrels of death were floating up on to the Cornish beaches. I was told by the then Prime Minister to deal with them. I found that the whole episode had been manufactured largely by the press as a scare. The toxic waste could not have floated ashore as its specific gravity was greater than that of water and it would have been bound to go the bottom of the Bay of Biscay. None the less, we used a frigate and three helicopters and I virtually stood the home guard, or whatever they were called, in Cornwall and Devon on the alert because there was a scare about "barrels of death."
It is important that Parliament should deal with these matters in a rational and sensible way to avoid the circulation of such scare stories.

Mr. Stephen Ross: I hope that the hon. Gentleman is not suggesting that the information I gave was incorrect, because it is all documented. I assure him that what I said was correct.

Mr. Griffiths: I was in no sense referring to the hon. Gentleman's contribution, but rather to events in the not so distant past.
Against the background of some of the real environmental dangers that we have seen in recent years, it is proper that the Community should now be taking this step.
I have only three points that I hope will assist my hon. Friend when, with the support of the House behind him, he negotiates the further details with some of his ministerial colleagues in Brussels.
I am in almost complete agreement with the Government's reservations. I am not persuaded that it is necessary to license all the handlers. That sounds sensible. If we license the site, should we not also license the person moving the material into the site and specify the strength and type of container that may carry it? I hope that my hon. Friend will carry with him the support of the House in resisting the proposal to license handlers, as that would impose additional cost and complexity on the process. If the system is to work, it must be relatively simple and not too expensive.
I also agree with my hon. Friend that we should resist the legal consequences in the United Kingdom of placing the responsibility at all stages on the producer of the waste. With my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy, we invented the notion that the polluter must pay. There is a lot in that, but if a company that produces waste has abided in every sense by the requirement to specify the nature of the waste when it leaves the plant and has ensured that the destination is capable of receiving and disposing of it, it would be wrong to carry through a legal liability on the original producer as it would cause all kinds of problems under British law. In spite of my hon. Friend's anxiety to see this regulation made, I hope that he will not be pushed around but will stand fairly strongly on the problems that would be faced in English law.
We are a smallish country with increasing amounts of complex wastes. In a sense, we should welcome that because it means that our more advanced industries are doing better. However, we have the problem of a limited number of holes in the ground. Sensibly-handled land-fill is an excellent way of dealing with waste, and there have been some splendid examples of land reclamation and the covering of land by trees and grass proving that, properly handled, land fill can add to rather than subtract from environmental attractions.
The hon. Member for South Shields said, "Don't put your waste in our dustbin because it is full", but we should not attempt to discriminate within the European Community about whose waste can go into holes in the ground, provided that they have been properly licensed. There may be occasions when we will want to put some of our waste into holes in the ground in France. I merely say that, within a community, it is absurd to try to patriotise specific holes in the ground. It will not work.

Mr. David Crouch: I hope that I have a little time before my hon. Friend the Minister replies.
I declare an interest in that I have spent my life in the chemical industry and have been for many years the chairman of the all-party committee on the chemical industry, which is associated, in its briefing, with the Chemical Industries Association.
We must not minimise the importance of handling hazardous waste. We know of Seveso, and the dangers surrounding dioxin and contaminated earth. Like nuclear waste, such substances are deadly dangerous. We must ensure that there are provisions to cover the handling of deadly dangerous and hazardous waste.
Consideration of who produces the waste in the first place—the primary producer—is not the paramount issue. There are secondary and tertiary producers of chemical products. Initially, the product is manufactured and known to be dangerous by a responsible producer. Subsequently, the product is sold and handled by someone else who uses it in a chemical or metal process. That person becomes a secondary user of the dangerous product. The product becomes waste in the hands not of the primary producer but of the secondary producer. The product may move further down the line and fall into the hands of a tertiary producer or user.
Problems arise when the third user does not realise that he is handling a dangerous product, which Government regulations in every member state have ensured that the primary producer is aware of. Whatever we do as a member state of the Community, we must remind the Council of Ministers and the Community as a whole of that fact of life.
Each country has its own record in dealing with this problem. The British chemical industry has a remarkably good record in its concern for the protection of the environment, for workers in factories who handle dangerous products, and for emission control and pollution. I am not saying that we have the best record in the world, but it is certainly very good. However, we can always improve.
In our small country local authorities are responsible for waste disposal, although they are supervised by the Department of the Environment. They are extremely

competent compared with other countries, such as the United States, which do not have such a strict system of central Government supervision over those local authorities.
I hope that a directive is all that will be required when dealing with this problem. I am sure that the good record of our industry and that of the local authorities does not require a regulation. Regulations contain an imperative. A directive is a much better way to deal with the problem. I hope that I have made my point clear.

Mr. Waldegrave: I am most grateful for the helpful comments made by hon. Members on both sides of the House, which will be of use in the Brussels negotiations. They will only begin to become serious at about this hour of the night and will continue, as I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Griffiths) remembers, well into the early hours. It is helpful to have such clarification at the back of my mind.
I shall try to answer some of the matters raised by the hon. Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark). However, in response first to my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch), I think that a directive is the more sensible form of legislation, although the Government do not feel passionately about that. The majority of our European colleagues consider that to be so, and it is more likely to be a directive. If the outcome of the discussions is a directive, the national definition of "hazard" would be used. I take my hon. Friend's comment about the competent waste disposal authorities—the local authorities—knowing where dangerous substances exist. That is important particularly in relation to the recyclables. Perhaps things have not always been clear in the past. I think that the consignment note system that we have tabled would help. The authorities would have the information sent to them, with full details about the substances and details relating to whom they were going.
My hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon (Mr. Watson) referred to our power to refuse land-fill. If the directive were passed, I do not think that we would be able to refuse the reception of waste at a site licensed for it, wherever it came from. There would be problems with trade barriers in the Community if wastes were refused. However, in the other place, the Select Committee drew attention to that point. There is a real issue here, and I assure hon. Members that we shall keep an eye on the situation. Clearly, land-fill sites are a finite resource, and if the now trivial trade developed rapidly, we might have to return to that subject.
I shall look into the point raised by the hon. Member for South Shields about transit through the United Kingdom to Ireland. I think that the amounts involved will be pretty small, but I shall try to find some figures on that. I note what he said about specific entry points. We are not enthusiastic about them. I take the hon. Gentleman's point. The danger is that we could become involved in a long wrangle over that, and that might mean a delay to the whole thing. I do not think that that is important enough to put at risk the basic system, and I suspect that we should get into some difficulty in that territory.
I come to a point mentioned by the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Ross). I do not think that large increases will be needed in county council staffs. Indeed, if the system worked more smoothly and automatically, staff might spend less time chasing round interviewing people,


and looking for information. Under this system, that will be made available to them. Increased manpower needs would become a serious problem only if the trade burgeoned in the next few years. However, we are talking about a fairly small tonnage of trans-frontier wastes. I think that about 2·5 million tonnes went across Community frontiers as a whole last year. However, only about 5,000 tonnes came into Britain, and much of that came from outside the Community. Therefore, from our point of view the tonnage is relatively small.
I think that I have covered the second point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon. However, he also wondered whether we felt that sometimes the balance of emphasis between nuclear and other dangerous substances was wrong. I rather sympathise with that point. We sometimes talk as if the dangers involved in radioactive substances are unique and particularly long lived. However, the Seveso incident has reminded is all that that is not so. There are chemicals that are just as long-lived, non-degradable and dangerous, as the nastiest of the radioactive chemicals. That is why it behoves us all to take care and to have sensible legislation on such matters.
The hon. Member for South Shields also asked about bilateral arrangements with his Scandinavian neighbours. A proposal similar to the European Community's document is under discussion in the OECD. We are closely involved with that. In OECD language it is a recommendation, and is likely to be agreed in the next few months. That will be helpful. However, the Scandinavian countries tend to have fairly high standards in these matters.
The hon. Member for Isle of Wight referred to labelling, which is at present dealt with under the ADR agreement. That is the non-European Community agreement. I do not say that there is no improvement to be found there. Indeed, there may be further work to be done. However, I do not want to widen the scope of the directive or enmesh us in a tangle of things that may put at risk the passage of the core directive.
I sympathise with the hon. Gentleman's points about article 9. He said that we should take care that things do not leave the Community and disappear out of all ken. We are still having discussions about whether there can be some arrangements about wastes that are shipped out of the Community for disposal. There should be some check that they have been disposed of.
The hon. Gentleman also mentioned shipborne wastes. This directive, as it is likely to become, will not cover some of the unpleasant substances such as oil that are accidentally sluiced out of ships. They are to be dealt with by an International Maritime Organisation convention, MARPOL 73–78, which came into force this October. A section of it, Annexe 2, which deals with liquid chemical waste will come into force in three years. We might be able to offer the hon. Gentleman some comfort on that point under the IMO rubric rather than under this directive. This legislation will not extend to considerations of compensation. There are discussions on that matter in the

EC but they are in the consumer affairs council because the matter is being discussed in the context of consumer liability.
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St. Edmunds as the only begetter of this directive He was right to say that the legislation with which he was originally associated formed the model for European legislation in this area. It is not unduly boastful to say that. It is fair for him to take credit for it. He was also right to say that, in terms of maintaining recyclables, this is a good, sensible communautaire trade to protect. I like the picture of him at the head of the home guard, rather like the late and much lamented John le Mesurier, dealing with the barrels of death. I take the point that these matters are sometimes the cause of good but, not always accurate stories in the press.
My hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury talked of the danger of over-licensing. In terms of our domestic wastes investigation—the Gregson committee—somewhat tortuous negotiations are still going on between local authorities and the chemical industry. There is a danger of too much legislation being aimed at a reasonable target which then escapes. It is not possible to catch the cowboys by putting more regulations on the people who behave sensibly.
I do not want to end on a negative note, but there is one item which we cannot accept. My hon. Friends the Members for Canterbury and for Bury St. Edmunds referred to it—the introduction of a simplistic concept of producer liability. Our courts would want to examine whose fault it really was and would not follow a rule of thumb saying that the primary producer had responsibility in every case. That is good law and common sense. We should not import such an idea. I made it clear to colleagues in Europe at the informal meeting at Athens, that we could not accept it.
I am grateful for the contribution that hon. Members have made to the debate. Their speeches confirm that the Government are on the right lines as to the type of package that we are trying to negotiate. I have some hopes that we shall be successful in Brussels on Monday—or Tuesday morning, as it is more likely to be—although, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St. Edmunds will recall, there are sometimes Gallic slips, or hazards of a non-chemical type, on the way to agreement on these matters. I do not want to sound over-optimistic, but there is no reason in common sense why we should not agree a sensible package of which we and all of our Community partners can be proud.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 4342/83, Proposal for a Council Directive on the Supervision and Control of Transfrontier Shipment of Hazardous Wastes Within the European Community, and 8124/83, Proposal for a Council Regulation on the Supervision and Control of Transfrontier Shipment of Hazardous Wastes Within the European Community; and supports the European Community's efforts to improve control over the transfrontier shipment of hazardous wastes.

Baljit Kaur

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Douglas Hogg.]

Ms. Clare Short: I welcome this opportunity to raise the case of my constituent, Baljit Kaur, and the refusal of the Minister of State, Home Office to allow her husband, Hardev Dosanj to join her and their newly born daughter in Birmingham. I ask the Minister to use his discretion to allow Baljit's husband to join her for two reasons. The first is to bring to an end the unhappiness of this young couple by allowing them to be together during the early growth of their first child, for humanity's sake, and for the sake of the family. Secondly, and very importantly, the Minister should not insist that they wait for the delay of an appeal.
It is important that, through this case, the Minister should send a message to the entry certificate officers in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh about the way in which they should interpret the relevant section of the immigration rules in relation to applications by husbands and fiancés from the Indian Sub-continent. If the Minister fails to intervene in this case, he will, in effect, be saying that he applauds and accepts their rigid interpretation of the rules, which is being used crudely to make it impossible for any Asian husband or fiancé to come here to join his wife and fiancée in Britain.
Since this case came to my attention, many others have been pointed out, such as Mrs. Salinder Kaur, who has a seven-month-old baby, whose husband has been refused entry on the same grounds. A Miss Dhillon—a vibrant and attractive young lady who had been brought up in Birmingham—went to India to meet the man that she intended to marry, and fell deeply in love. However, her fiancé has been excluded under the rules, and she is now a tearful and unhappy girl.
I shall tell the House the story about this case, and then return to the general rules. Baljit Kaur is 20. She was born and brought up in Birmingham, and is a British citizen. She is as much a British citizen as I am. I am a child of Irish immigrant parents. I was born in Birmingham and I grew up there. Baljit should have the same rights as a citizen as I have.
In 1982 Baljit went to India with her mother and younger brother. She went to see her granny and her aunt. No marriage had been arranged. She told me—I spoke to her this evening again—that she felt that she was ready for marriage as she was 20. She was willing to consider any suitable offer, but she was not sure whether she would like to marry a man from India, or would prefer to marry someone from England. Before she left, her father told her that this was entirely a matter for her but that if she met and liked someone she should marry him. There was no pressure on her to do so. If she did not a marriage would be found in the United Kingdom.
While Baljit was in India, an uncle of hers, who knew well the family of Hardev Dosanj, who is now her husband, suggested to the young man and his family that he might like to consider a marriage to Baljit. He and his family came to see Baljit. She met and liked him quite a lot, but did not decide that she would like to marry him. The decision was hers, and no pressure was exerted on her

by the family. After three or four months, she decided that she would like to marry Hardev Dosanj, and in August, they married.
Baljit tells me that she married in India because her granny and aunt were there, and if her husband had applied to come back to Britain, and done so, her granny and aunt would not have been at the wedding. It was therefore decided that they would marry in India, have a family celebration, and her granny would be able to see her first grandchild in that family get married. They hoped as a family to stay while his application was processed and he waited in the queue, and, when he got permission to come to the United Kingdom, her mother, brother, she and her husband could come back together to be reunited with the rest of the family in Britain.
In October 1982 her brother became ill—he had been ill for some time—and her mother decided that the only sensible thing to do was to bring him back to the United Kingdom where he could get better medical treatment. Baljit tells me that she was happy in her marriage but that she missed her family in the United Kingdom and missed her mother. She visited her aunt and grandmother a great deal to get through the time. In January she knew that she was pregnant, and she wanted even more to be with her mother and to have her mother's advice. When I asked her whether her aunt could have had advised her, she said, "Yes, of course; my aunt has had many children. But I am an English girl and I grew up in England, and the advice of my aunt would not be suitable for me." Baljit is a Birmingham girl who thinks of herself as being English, which is why she wishes to make her life with her family here.
Baljit returned here in April, partly because her ticket was running out and partly because she was pregnant and wished to have proper medical care. When she came back, she was confident that, shortly thereafter, her husband would be interviewed—the date of interview was already set—and he would be given permission to come to the United Kingdom, because there was no question but that they were married and that they were about to have a child.
Baljit came to see me just after the election. She was pregnant, and very anxious that her husband should join her before the baby was born. For that reason, I wrote to the Minister asking that the case be dealt with—again, we had no doubt that his entry would be permitted—sufficiently speedily so that her husband could be with her before their first child was born. On 1 September I received a letter from the Minister of State saying that Baljit's husband had been refused entry. The letter stated:
Mr. Dosanjh was specifically asked by the entry clearance officer if his marriage had been arranged solely for immigration purposes and he openly agreed that this was so.
I thought that improbable, but I sent the letter to Baljit and asked for her views. She was enormously shocked and upset. Until then she had had no doubt that he would come, but was worried only about the time of his arrival. She was convinced that he would have said nothing that could have led to that conclusion, because their marriage was not like that. There was no long arrangement, and he was not seeking a marriage that would bring him to the United Kingdom.
Therefore, I requested a meeting with the Minister, which we had recently. The Minister agreed that the couple were married, that the child was their child, that Baljit loved her husband and wanted him with her, but he


said that he would not intervene in the decision. He said that there was no point in interviewing her because he accepted the truth of what she said about the marriage and her feelings towards her husband. He said that the rule was that the husband or fiancé was not allowed in if the marriage was contracted primarily because he intended to come to the United Kingdom. He was convinced, because of the answers allegedly given by Baljit's husband, that this was so in his case.
I made some notes from memory after the meeting about what the Minister claimed Baljit's husband had answered. The notes read as follows. He was asked why he had obtained a passport in 1980, considerably before the marriage was contracted, and he is supposed to have said that he wanted to go to the United Kingdom, like his cousins who were already there. He was asked why we wished to go to the United Kingdom, and he is supposed to have said, "In order to earn money." He was then asked whether his desire to go to the United Kingdom was the sole reason for his marriage, and he was supposed to have said, "Yes." That is enormously improbable, and the series of questions was bound to lead to trouble, but he is alleged to have said those things.
Those of us who have visited the Indian sub-continent and experienced such interviews will know that they are conducted through interpreters, with a great possibility of differences of nuance in questions and answers. However, knowing that, I put to Baljit what the Minister said. She simply did not believe it was possible, because it was so far from the truth, for her husband to have given such answers. It was not the way in which their marriage was arranged or took place.
I asked her to write to her husband and to obtain from him an account of the questions he was asked at the interview and his answers. She did that, and received in return a long series of questions—about 30—and the answers which he gave. One question was why he had obtained a passport before the marriage, and he said that his answer was that he intended to work in an Arab country. Apparently it was not until Baljit's uncle suggested the marriage to Baljit that he thought there was any real possibility that he might go to the United Kingdom.
In answer to the question—one that the Minister did not tell me had been asked; one sees the attempted trickery of it, in my view—"When you are prepared to leave your parents, why can't she come to live in India so that you can be with your parents?", he said that he answered, "It is her will. As she was born and grew up in the United Kingdom and wants to stay there, I will go to be with her." He also says that he was asked, "Why do you intend to go to the United Kingdom? Do you want to earn more money?" He answered, "Marriages are intended that husband and wife should be together, not alone. Because I am married to a British-born girl, I want to go and stay and be with her."
It is overwhelmingly clear that this is a genuine marriage, and that refusal to permit this young couple to be together is cruel and unnecessary. From the experience that I have in my constituency, it seems to be a precedent for other similar cases. Since the Government changed the rules on marriages, they have moved the burden of proof on to the applicant—the husband or the fiancé—to prove that it is not his primary purpose to come to the United Kingdom. Whether it becomes an absolute bar to entry for genuine marriages, or whether it is simply a way

of filtering out marriages of convenience, seems to depend on how the rule is interpreted. I suggest that the way in which the Minister's staff in the Indian Sub-continent are now interpreting the rule is making it a bar to entry when they so wish. They say to a young man who has married a young girl, knowing that she lives in the United Kingdom, and that it is part of the arrangement that they will live in the United Kingdom together, "Why did you many? Why do you want to come to the United Kingdom? Is that part of the purpose of your marriage?" It is part of the arrangement. One might as well ask, "Why did Lady Di marry Prince Charles? Was part of her purpose to live in Buckingham Palace?" We could all ask ourselves why we got married, and was the aim to better our lives? It is easy to move on from that question to ask "Is the primary purpose to come to the United Kingdom", and thus exclude all marriages of people who come from the Indian Sub-continent. We seem to have reached that stage.
The way in which the rule is not being interpreted makes it an impossible test. In my view, it is in breach of article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which gives the right to many and found a family. In interpreting the rules as they are, the Minister and his officials are refusing my constituent the right that she has under article 8 of that convention. Under article 12, people have the right to enjoy the rights and freedoms set out in the convention without discrimination on any grounds, such as sex, race colour, national origin, and so on.
I appeal to the Minister to be generous in this case, for the sake not only of this young couple and their little daughter, but of others, by telling his officials that he expects them to interpret the rules in a humane, decent and legal way.

The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. David Waddington): I am grateful to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Ms. Short) for the moderate way in which she put her case and because it gives me an opportunity to answer a number of allegations that she made recently, notably in early-day motion 259.
Mrs. Baljit Kaur travelled to India in June 1982 and in August married Mr. Dosanjh, a citizen of that country. He now seeks settlement in the United Kingdom in right of that marriage. His application has, however, been refused because he failed to satisfy the entry clearance officer in accordance with rule 54(a) that the marriage was not entered into primarily to obtain admission to the country.
It is plain from early-day motion 259 that the hon. Lady does not like the rule to which I have referred. That is a matter for her. She is entitled to her opinion, but the rules of which rule 54 is one were approved by Parliament after a lengthy debate as recently as February this year. The hon. Lady is not entitled to suggest that I should ignore the rules or put a completely artificial interpretation on plain words to avoid making uncomfortable decisions.
When a person fails to qualify under the rules, the Home Secretary may, in exceptional compassionate circumstances, exercise his undoubted discretion and admit a person outside the rules. He has no right to say that the rules mean one thing when they clearly mean another, and refuse to apply a safeguard against abuse which Parliament wished to see in the rules.
I return to Mr. Dosanjh and consider what he said when he applied for entry clearance in New Delhi. It is easy for someone who is caught by the rule to say after the


interview that he did not say what he is recorded as having said. I have recently returned from the Indian subcontinent. I have seen our entry clearance officers at work. They carry out a most difficult job with great expertise, tolerance and fairness. I have no reason to believe that the entry clearance officer in this case was prepared to lie and record what was not said by this young man. He said that it had been his anbition to go to the United Kingdom since his two cousins had gone there a few years previously. He said that he wanted to earn more money like everyone else who went there—that is, to the United Kingdom. He said that he thought that he could achieve his ambition—admission to the United Kingdom—through marriage. When the entry clearance officer put to him in terms that the sole purpose of the marriage was to gain entry to the United Kingdom, Mr. Dosanjh admitted that that was the case.
Whenever there is a law or a rule, there will be difficult borderline cases about which it is difficult to judge whether they fall one side of the line or the other. This does not seem to be a borderline case. Someone else may come to a different conclusion, but the matter is clear to me as it was to the entry clearance officer and the other officials who considered the matter and decided that Mr. Dosanjh's application should be refused.
I want to make it plain to the hon. Lady that the entry clearance officer and the other officials who considered the case were not passing judgment on Baljit Kaur. They were interested in Mr. Dosanjh's motives, not those of Mrs. Kaur. It is worth reminding ourselves of a bit of the history of husband applications under the rules.
The first safe guards to prevent abuse of the marriage provisions in the rules were introduced by the Labour Government in 1977. The then Minister who held my responsibilities, Dr. Shirley Summerskill, said that evidence left no doubt that there was substantial abuse. In other words, the right on the part of a woman settled here to bring in her husband was being substantially abused. As a result, the Labour Government changed what was then the rule to provide for refusal of entry clearance if the entry clearance officer had reason to believe that the marriage was one of convenience entered into primarily to obtain admission into the United Kingdom with no intention that the marriage should subsist thereafter. That was the position after 1977.
In 1979, the Conservative Government decided to strengthen what by then had come to be known as the safeguards against abuse. I shall quote what my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Raison), said in the debate on immigration on 4 December 1979:
We are not talking about the marriage of convenience that takes place purely to secure entry and then collapses. That is dealh with under the present rules, if somewhat imperfectly. We are talking about marriages that may last but are merely for the purpose of immigration.
Later in the same debate, referring to the new primary purpose test, he said:
Our proposals will help to seal off an avenue of primary immigration."—[Official Report, 4 December 1979; Vol. 975, c. 368–72.]
My noble Friend Lord Whitelaw said on the same occasion:
What we are discussing is the question of men being able to use a provision in our immigration control which enables them to settle on marriage when they could qualify to come in no other

way. We must stop this loophole. The Government have a clear mandate to do so."—[Official Report, 4 December 1979; Vol. 975, c. 254.]
Therefore, one cannot possibly come to the conclusion that in 1979 the Conservative Government were out only to catch the simple obvious marriage of convenience where the man did not really intend to live with the woman at all or at any rate for any longer than was strictly necessary. The intention was to go wider than that, and the rules do go wider than that.

Ms. Clare Short: Will the Minister clarify what he is saying? It appears to me from the quotations that he has just given that it would be impossible for any young Asian man seeking to marry and live with a woman in the United Kingdom not to breach that rule. Is he saying that the rule was intended to prevent young Asian women who are British from marrying any Asian men from the Indian subcontinent?

Mr. Waddington: I am saying nothing of the sort, and I shall reinforce that in a moment. The facts belie what the hon. Lady suggests.
In 1979 we knew what we wanted to do and we did precisely what we said that we would do. We made it clear in the debate what we were doing. We were not attacking the traditional Asian custom of arranged marriages. We were out to try to stop that system being abused—to prevent marriages being used by people to get into this country.
The early-day motion is nonsense for a number of reasons. It is also thoroughly mischievous and misleading. First, contrary to what the motion says, I am not putting a cruel interpretation on the rules controlling the entry of husbands and fiancés. Entry clearance officers are applying the plain language of the rules, so the early-day motion is wrong when it suggests that I am putting a cruel interpretation on the rules.
Secondly, it is not a policy decided by me that is being applied; what is being applied is a set of rules approved by Parliament. Again, therefore, it is nonsense to state, as the hon. Lady states in the early-day motion, that what is in issue here is a policy propounded and decided by me.
Thirdly, the rules—and this rule in particular—are not designed to split families; and it is not the rules, as the hon. Lady knows perfectly well, that are separating this young couple. They are separate at present because the woman decided to come back here, having lived in India with her husband for the first eight months of her marriage. Incidentally, by doing so—and now inviting her husband to join her here—she is not acting in accordance with the traditional custom, as I understand it, in arranged marriages. So, again, that statement in the motion is nonsense.
Fourthly, the rule is not designed to prevent British women from marrying men from the sub-continent. Had it been so designed, it would have been badly designed because a very small percentage of husbands are refused on the grounds of primary purpose.
Mr. Dosanjh can exercise the generous rights of appeal that we in Britain afford to people in his position. It is sometimes forgotten how generous are our rights of appeal, and I have already told the hon. Lady that the case will be reviewed again in the light of any recommendations that the adjudicator may make. Nothing could be fairer than that.
For the moment, I can see no case for acting exceptionally outside the rules, particularly when the rules have bitten because Mr. Dosanjh has failed to fulfil a requirement put there for the specific purpose of preventing abuse.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at three minutes past Twelve o' clock.